Less than two months into the job, the chief executive officer of Bamboo Airways (QH, Hanoi Noi Bai International) has resigned. The airline announced the resignation of Nguyen Minh Hai on July 11, saying deputy chairman Nguyen Ngoc Trong would step in and serve as Acting CEO. Meanwhile, a former executive at JAL - Japan Airlines (JL, Tokyo Haneda) served an even briefer tenure at the carrier's chairman.
The departure caps a period of board transition at the airline, with multiple members resigning following a large annual loss, then getting re-elected at an annual general meeting in June. Hai, a former deputy general director of Vietnam Airlines (VN, Hanoi Noi Bai International), took on the CEO's role in May. He said restoring the airline to profitability under a new investor, the Him Lam Corporation, was a top priority. Vietnamese language media outlets reported that Hai's departure was linked to the airline's restructuring.
This week's board meeting also approved the June re-election of Le Thai Sam, Oshima Hideki, Le Ba Nguyen, and Nguyen Ngoc Trong. Notably, Sam, who is now reported to own 53.6% of the airline's stock, was elected chairman of the board, and Hideki, a former deputy chief executive at Japan Airlines, and briefly Bamboo Airways chairman, was appointed as Standing Vice Chairman of the Board of Directors. Hideki was slated to be the board's chairman until 2028, but it appears Sam's recent stock acquisitions put paid to that. Hideki served 16 days in the chairman's role.
Chairman Sam previously held a 38% stake in Bamboo Airways, but he recently purchased 772 million additional shares in exchange for taking on VND7.72 trillion (USD326.1 million) worth of debt, in the process sending his stake in the airline past the 50% mark.
Bamboo Airways recently reported a loss of VND17.6 trillion dong (USD743.4 million) for the 12 months to December 31, 2022, which the airline attributed to lacklustre passenger demand across Northeast Asia and high fuel prices sheeted back to the Russia-Ukraine conflict.
