Qantas tech chief becomes Jetstar CEO

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The executive who has described himself as Qantas’ “quasi-chief information officer” has been promoted out of his role to head up the Australia and New Zealand operations of the airline’s JetStar subsidiary.

In a statement yesterday, Qantas chief executive Alan Joyce announced the airline’s group executive of corporate services and technology David Hall — who has for the past several years been the dominant face of technology at Qantas — would be promoted to the role of Jetstar CEO for Australia and New Zealand as part of a wider restructure.

As part of the shift, Hall’s responsibiity for Qantas’ QFuture internal transformation program will be shifted to the airline’s chief financial officer, Gareth Evans.

However, he will retain responsibility for “Business Information Solutions” in the near term — with the airline stating new arrangements would be finalised.

Former Bain consultant Jayne Hrdlicka will join Qantas and assume responsibility for the strategy components of Hall’s role.

The news comes as another technology heavyweight joins the airline, in the person of former NSW Department of Education and Training CIO Stephen Wilson. Wilson joins the airline as its ‘head of technology’ — replacing the current executive in that role, Segar Reddy, who will remain with the airline.

Qantas is currently embarking simultaneously on a major cost-cutting exercise within its IT support operation, as well as overhauling several key systems.

For example, a year ago, Hall — who has described himself in public as Qantas’ “quasi-chief information officer” — told a business lunch in Sydney that he believed Qantas could cut its IT costs by $100 million over the succeeding financial year, although it remains to be seen if those goals have been met.

In addition, Qantas has over the past year overhauled its outsourcing arrangements, commenced an internal deployment of Cisco IP telephony hardware and begun replacing its Lotus Notes/Domino email platform with Microsoft Outlook/Exchange.

Image credit: Qantas