MAS's Jala resigns to join government, credited with guiding major turnaround

Malaysia Airlines MD and CEO Idris Jala resigned from the carrier upon being appointed to join the government as a cabinet minister in charge of a new Performance Management and Delivery Unit. CFO Azmil Zahruddin was named the airline's CEO effective immediately. Jala leaves MAS having overseen one of the more remarkable turnarounds in recent airline industry history. He joined the carrier as MD/CEO on Dec. 1, 2005, with little background in air transport, having been recruited from Shell Malaysia. MAS faced a life-or-death crisis; its books showed that it would be insolvent and out of business by April 2006 if the rate of loss continued.

Jala presented a Business Turnaround Plan to the airline's board, the prime minister and the Ministry of Transport on his first day on the job. It identified four critical weaknesses at MAS: Low yield, inefficient network, low productivity and lack of cost control. By 2007, after implementing a number of Jala's strategies to counter the flaws, the carrier was enjoying record-breaking profitability (ATWOnline, Feb. 26, 2008). ATW's 2008 Phoenix Award winner (ATW, February 2008) has continued to produce strong results even in the global economic downturn, recently announcing the largest quarterly surplus in its history with an MYR876.3 million ($250 million) profit for the three months ended June 30 (ATWOnline, Aug. 11).