Australian Airline Qantas Names its First Female Chief Executive

Sydney — Australian airline Qantas on Tuesday announced that chief executive Alan Joyce will be replaced by current chief financial officer Vanessa Hudson, making her the first female boss of the carrier in its 103-year history.

Qantas said that Hudson, who has been at the company for 28 years, would continue in her current role while also being chief executive designate before officially taking over from Joyce, who is retiring, following the 2023 Annual General Meeting in November.

"It's an absolute honour to be asked to lead the national carrier," Hudson said. "This is an exceptional company full of incredibly talented people and it's very well positioned for the future."

Chairman Richard Goyder said that "a lot of thought has gone into this succession" as he thanked Joyce for his leadership.

"Much of the credit for the bright future in front of Qantas goes to Alan," Goyder said.

"At the Board's request, I extended my time as CEO to see through the Covid recovery plan, so now that we're on the other side of that crisis it's a logical time for me to step down," said Joyce, who has been in the role since 2008.

Joyce also commended Qantas for making history in appointing its first female chief executive.

"I am... very pleased that in the 103 years of Qantas' history there has only been 12 CEOs, this is the first female CEO in that length of time, and that is a credit to the merit and the capability of the strong women that we have in the management team.

"There's not many female CEOs in the worldwide aviation industry and it's a credit to this country that a gay Irish man was appointed 15 years ago to be CEO of the company and now we have the first female."

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