Dallas-based Southwest Airways has a brand new chief know-how officer, Lauren Woods, in a transfer already deliberate earlier than the corporate got here underneath hearth for a vacation disaster in December, the corporate introduced Wednesday.
Woods replaces senior vp and chief info officer Kathleen Merrill, who determined to retire in December and transfer into an govt advisor function. Merrill had been working with the service since 2017 and since 2004.
CEO Bob Jordan beforehand launched Woods as the brand new chief info officer, however the firm had not formally introduced the management change.
“Lauren’s in depth expertise has ready her nicely for this essential function as she has constructed a superb status for being an revolutionary and transformational chief in our know-how division and throughout the corporate,” Jordan stated in a press release .
![Lauren Woods, Southwest Airlines Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer.](https://dmn-dallas-news-prod.cdn.arcpublishing.com/resizer/KtigYkdZ7rWXwviDOMhvIhZpjF4=/930x0/smart/filters:no_upscale()/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/dmn/FSH5CUA5WRGX7CNDUUMX3IKFGU.jpg)
Woods could have a key function within the firm as Southwest tries to modernize its know-how techniques after canceling 16,700 flights in December.
A large winter storm and deficiencies in its crew scheduling software program left the corporate unable to trace pilots and flight attendants. It crippled operations for greater than every week, finally forcing the service to close down about two-thirds of its operations to reset.
The corporate initially stated its crew scheduling software program, offered by GE Digital, was outdated, however has since cited climate as the principle perpetrator.
Regardless, Jordan stated the corporate plans to speed up know-how initiatives to make sure such a failure does not occur once more. The disaster value the corporate $800 million and led to a loss within the fourth quarter, with one other $250 million to $350 million prone to come within the first quarter.
Southwest spends about $1 billion a 12 months on know-how infrastructure and plans to spend about $1.three billion this 12 months, not together with in-flight upgrades equivalent to higher wi-fi Web and in-seat energy retailers arriving planes.
Woods has been with Southwest for 13 years and has been concerned in a number of the firm’s key know-how initiatives throughout that point, together with the combination of the AirTran acquisition and the introduction of a brand new reservation system from Amadeus in 2017.
At Southwest, the chief know-how officer stories to Linda Rutherford, the corporate’s director of administration and communications.