Easyjet’s boss has been forced to resign after steering the airline through the pandemic.
Johan Lundgren will be replaced by financial boss Kenton Jarvis early next year.
The pair worked together at rival Tui, where Lundgren rose to deputy CEO before taking the helm of Easyjet in 2017, replacing Carolyn McCall, who is now the boss of ITV.
But Lundgren’s tenure was far from smooth.
Easyjet faced major turbulence during the pandemic as lockdowns and travel restrictions brought the sector to its knees.
Departure: Easyjet boss Johan Lundgren will be replaced by financial boss Kenton Jarvis early next year
He then had to fight for his job after Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou, the founder and largest shareholder, tried to fire him.
When asked if he regretted anything, he said: ‘Gosh, yes. You don’t do this unless you also think it could have been done better.
‘But we did well on the things that really matter.’
Lundgren ran into trouble in 2019 when he increased the price of the ticket to Madrid to £1,000 after two British teams qualified for football’s Champions League final that year.
He said the increase was driven by the “huge” increase in demand.
The group made a loss of £350 million in the six months to the end of March.
This was down from losses of £411 million in the same period the year before.
Easyjet has pinned its hopes on a new record summer.
This will be boosted by new bases in Birmingham and Alicante and growing demand for parcels.
But shares fell 6 percent, or 31.7p, to 497.7p yesterday.
Russ Mold of AJ Bell said: ‘The negative share price reaction implies the market doesn’t approve and investors wanted an outsider to shake things up.’