AMR has appointed Daniel Garton as president and chief executive of subsidiary American Eagle Airlines and reiterated its plans to potentially divest the regional operator.
Returning to American Eagle after spending 12 years at its sister American Airlines, Garton succeeds Peter Bowler, a 26-year company veteran who last month announced his retirement from the airline.
Garton will assume his new duties immediately and retain his role on AMR's executive committee. Additionally, Garton will continue in his current role as executive vice president-marketing at American until a successor is named.
"Dan [Garton] has remarkable talent and ability that - when coupled with his broad knowledge of the challenging airline industry and his insight from his time as President of American Eagle - make him uniquely qualified to lead American Eagle, especially as we begin a strategic evaluation of the regional airline," says AMR chairman and CEO Gerard Arpey in a statement.
AMR first unveiled plans to divest American Eagle in late 2007. At that time, the company said it was studying a number of options for divestiture, including a spin-off to shareholders, a sale to a third party or some other form of separation. But in July 2008, AMR put on hold its efforts to divest the wholly-owned subsidiary, saying it would wait until the industry had stabilized before moving forward.
Garton says he believes there is now "a tremendous opportunity to begin a new chapter in the airline's history, creating new possibilities for our customers, partners and employees".
Garton joined American in 1984 and held a variety of staff positions in the sales, marketing, finance and airport operations departments at American, in addition to a three-year tenure as president of American Eagle.
He left AMR briefly to serve for two years as senior vice-president and chief financial officer of Continental Airlines before returning in 1995 to AMR to assume the presidency of American Eagle.
Source: Air Transport Intelligence news
