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Travelport overhauls global commercial leadership

Travelport overhauls global commercial leadership

Travelport has revealed a number of leadership moves and expanded roles within its commercial organisation. 

The new appointments, which are designed to provide even greater focus on supporting the growth plans of Travelport customers across the globe, all take immediate effect.

Sandra McLeod has been named as the new chief executive of Locomote, the fast-growing Australian corporate travel technology company in
which Travelport took a majority ownership stake in October.

Most recently as group vice president for global accounts and corporate development, McLeod previously had overall global responsibility for developing and executing a customer-focussed strategy to service, support and help grow Travelport’s largest travel management company customers and global corporate accounts. 

McLeod will leverage her corporate travel experience and key relationships with the global players, along with her 25 years of international experience in international sales, training and customer service delivery within Travelport, in her new role at Locomote.

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At the same time, Scott Hyden, formerly managing director for Travelport Americas, becomes global vice president, Enterprise Customer Group. 

This newly formed group takes on responsibility for McLeod’s former role with global TMCs and corporate customers and adds to its responsibility for the company’s largest online travel agency customers, such as Expedia and Priceline who operate across multiple geographies and with whom Hyden already has close working relationships.

Before joining Travelport, Hyden served as President of STA Travel, the largest global student and youth travel agency, and before that he was General Manager for Travelocity Business.

Prior to this he spent ten years in a number of roles at American Airlines.

In turn, Bret Kidd, has been appointed as the new managing director for Travelport Americas and will have overall responsibility for the company’s travel agency, TMC and regional OTA customers across the region.

Kidd joined Travelport from Stratos Management Systems, a private equity backed IT services firm that he co-founded and grew to over $130 million.

Previously, Kidd worked for HP in a number of senior roles including leading the HP Enterprise Services’ Global Public Sector Group and managing large customer accounts in the Travel and Transportation sector.

Dan Westbrook replaces Kidd as general manager for Travelport’s Air Commerce Technologies business.