Robert Antoniuk promoted to Director Customer Experience and Airports

15 dicembre 2003

oneworld™, the leading international airline alliance, has promoted its Manager Brand Performance and Development Robert Antoniuk to fill the role of Director Customer Experience and Airports in its central management team.

In his new role, reporting to oneworld Managing Partner John McCulloch and based in oneworld's Vancouver offices, he will co-ordinate efforts by the grouping's partners - American Airlines, British Airways, Qantas, Cathay Pacific Airways, Iberia, LanChile, Finnair, Aer Lingus and, from early next year, Swiss International Air Lines – to co-locate and share airport facilities and to improve further on their joint customer service programmes.

The alliance's member airlines already share facilities at around 25 airports worldwide. Key programmes currently underway cover activity at Los Angeles, with the improvements announced last week for the Tom Bradley International Terminal, which is used by Aer Lingus, British Airways, Cathay Pacific, LanChile and, for most departures, Qantas, and London Heathrow, with the opening of Terminal 5 in 2008 enabling the grouping to consolidate operations which are currently split across four terminals.

In customer services, oneworld was the first of the global airline alliances to commit to full e-ticketing between all of its member airlines, more than 18 months ahead of any of its competitors. The roll-out is currently in progress, on track for completion by the end of 2004.

Robert Antoniuk succeeds Ricardo Milani, who is moving on from the oneworld Management Company (oMC) after three years. Robert joined oneworld in 2001 from the Insurance Corporation of British Columbia, where he had been Senior Manager Regional Marketing. He previously served with the HSBC group in Canada as Regional Marketing Manager and Senior Manager Human Resources.

His recent oneworld projects have included co-ordinating the design of the new joint oneworld transfer facilities at Heathrow Terminal 3 and shared check-in and ticket desks at Zurich and Stockholm.

Managing Partner John McCulloch said: "As oneworld seeks to build further on its position as the leading airline alliance in the field of customer service, providing its customers and airlines with benefits and value that no airline can generate on its own, this is a key position. Robert has proven his ability to deliver in wide-range of alliance areas. It is a reflection of the range and depth of skills in our central team that we have been able to promote from within, selecting from a high-calibre list of candidates from across the alliance."

Between them, oneworld's existing eight member airlines plus member elect SWISS serve more countries than any global airline alliance, with flights to 575 destinations in 136 countries. Members of any oneworld airline's frequent flyer scheme can earn awards and points on eligible fares and redeem them throughout this network. The eight airlines and their affiliates carried more than 220 million passengers last year on a combined fleet of almost 2.000 aircraft, earning revenues of some US$50 billion. In the past three years, oneworld has delivered more than US$2 billion in value to its members, through increased revenue and cost savings. It was recently named the World's Leading Airline Alliance in the World Travel Awards, based on votes cast by 80.000 travel agencies professionals from more than 200 countries.

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