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Swiss Names New CEO

April 20, 2004
https://p.dw.com/p/4vlt

Swiss International Air Lines has named former Deutsche Bahn executive Christoph Franz as its new CEO. He succeeds Andre Dose, who resigned last month following speculation that he could face legal action over a 2001 Crossair crash that killed 24 people. Crossair was a subsidiary of Swissair. Franz was with Deutsche Bahn for the past nine years, most recently as a member of executive management in charge of passenger sales. But he was forced to leave the company after intense criticism of his reforms to DB's price system. The unpopular changes resulted in heavy losses and customer complaints. Swiss's board of directors were perhaps more impressed by Franz's role in the early 1990s with German national carrier Lufthansa, where he was part of the team that engineered the airline's financial turnaround after the Gulf War. Franz is planning on being part of a similar rehaul at Swiss, which has struggled financially since it was launched two years ago.