SriLankan Airlines appoints Barry Brown as Head of Commercial

SriLankan Airlines, the national carrier of Sri Lanka, has appointed Mr Barry Brown to the global role of Head of Commercial, as part of the airline's major new growth strategy.

Mr Brown, a former Manager Australia for SriLankan, will play a leading role in the airline’s new growth plan, which includes route expansion and a significant increase in new technology to improve the carrier’s booking, ticketing and revenue management systems.

In his new role, effective immediately, Mr Brown is responsible for a vast portfolio, including SriLankan’s global sales, pricing, distribution, e-commerce, schedule planning, revenue optimisation and yield management.

Also within this role will be travel industry relations, international relations, SriLankan Airlines Holidays, new Domestic Air Taxi services and the carrier’s participation in the Skywards frequent flyer programme with its partner airline and major shareholder, Emirates.

Mr Brown’s appointment comes as the airline emerges from a post-tsunami review of priorities, and enters a major new growth phase, with entry into IATA’s Billing and Settlement Programme (BSP), plus new schedules, the introduction of e-ticketing and the launch of a new internet booking engine.

SriLankan also is moving even closer to Emirates with an expanded code share relationship, which now enables the Sri Lankan airline to offer service to most cities in Europe and to New York.

Australia remains on the list of destinations which the airline plans to serve online with long-range Airbus A340 aircraft, but has been deferred because of the impact of the tsunamis, and the need to rebuild other online markets. 

The Australian route will be reconsidered later this year, with a view to possible commencement of SriLankan Airlines services in 2006. In the meantime, the airline has commenced daily codeshare operations with Emirates between Sydney and Bangkok, Melbourne and Singapore and Brisbane and Singapore.

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