Travelport Appoints Stephen Shurrock as Chief Commercial Officer

Travelport has appointed Stephen Shurrock as Executive Vice President and Chief Commercial Officer, replacing Kurt Ekert who leaves the company at the end of the year, as the position relocates to the UK.

Stephen joins Travelport from Telefonica, one of the largest telecommunications companies in the world, where he is currently CEO of its Consumer Division, responsible for both the consumer business and digital divisions globally.

Stephen's appointment will become effective on 4 January 2016.

As Chief Commercial Officer, Stephen will lead Travelport's customer-focused teams in air, agency, hospitality and digital media around the world, as well as having global responsibility for customer engagement, product strategy, marketing and market research.

Based in Travelport's global headquarters in Langley, UK, Stephen will report directly into President and CEO, Gordon Wilson.

Stephen Shurrock, said, "I am excited to be joining a business that is leading both innovation and change in its industry. At a time when Travelport is strengthening its portfolio of products and services, I believe there is a great opportunity to bring approaches and strategic thinking from related industries and apply them to airline merchandising, hotel distribution, mobile travel commerce and B2B payments. I look forward to joining the team in the New Year."

Stephen will join Travelport in January from Telefonica, where he currently manages the global Consumer Division. His prior roles with Telefonica include CEO of O2 Ireland and CEO of Telefonica's New Digital Business and Innovation division where Stephen was responsible for establishing and running digital businesses to take advantage of new growth markets in security, advertising, financial services, over the top content and big data. Before joining Telefonica/O2 in 2001, Stephen was CFO of UK-based web portal Excite.

Stephen has also held board positions for Telefonica Digital, San Francisco -based Tokbox, and Axonix, the specialist RTB mobile ad exchange. He has also held a non-executive director role at Monitise PLC and continues to be a non-executive director for Travelodge UK.