Malaysia Airlines picks new chief commercial officer

Malaysia Airlines has appointed Dersenish Aresandiran (pictured left) as its new chief commercial officer of its airlines business, including Malaysia Airlines, Firefly and MASwings, according to an internal memo to the staff of Malaysia Airlines that was seen by A+M.

He will assume his new position on 1 July 2023 and will report directly to the airlines’ chief executive officer, Ahmad Luqman Mohd Azmi. 

“A decision was made to re-designate the role of chief revenue officer to chief commercial officer,” the memo read. "After an extensive search and careful consideration, we have successfully concluded our quest," it continued. 

Dersenish is no stranger to the airline, having worked at the company for nearly eight years, from 2007 to 2011 and 2018 to 2021.

He has held the roles of revenue analyst revenue management, controller of advertising and promotions, head of chief commercial officer’s office, head of commercial planning of business insights and market development, as well as global head of revenue management and commercial planning during his time at the airlines.

Alongside Malaysian Airlines, Dersenish has also had stints at Qatar Airways and airasia. He joined the former in 2015 and held the role of head commercial innovation, solutions and network market development. After over two years, he was promoted to vice president commercial sales, e-commerce and commercial innovation. A role he held for just over a year. 

He later rejoined Qatar Airways as its vice president of sales in 2021, a role he held for just under two years. 

An avid leader in the aviation industry, Dersenish was also part of the group head revenue management strategy and planning team where he worked on solutions to increase revenue and market share domination. In his four years there, he also set up a revenue management and commercial strategy for two new international hubs in Thailand and Indonesia with its Thailand entity recording profit within six months of operations.

A+M has reached out for more information on the appointment.

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Malaysia Airlines has been on a hiring spree as of late. Earlier this year, it appointed Juliana Chua its new head of brand strategy and creative. Prior to Chua’s appointment at Malaysia Airlines, she was the head of marketing at mattress company Sonno for the latter half of 2022. Prior to Chua, the airline also hired Hemanth Jayaraman and promoted Waikuan Wong in senior roles of head of marketing for the airline's loyalty and travel solutions arm and head of airlines global marketing respectively. 

All of these hires come as Malaysia Aviation Group looks to implement overall leadership changes as it proceeds forward with a new target operating model. The new operating model will oversee support functions and subsidiaries across its dedicated profit centres, namely airlines, loyalty and travel solutions, and aviation services. Malaysia Aviation Group (MAG) current Airlines business portfolio that serves the global, domestic and segmented market comprises Malaysia Airlines – the national carrier of Malaysia, Firefly and MASwings – the regional airlines focused on serving communities across Malaysia, and AMAL by Malaysia Airlines – leading one-stop pilgrimage travel solutions centre.

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