Rod Eddington Biography| who is Rod Eddington?| Rod Eddington
Rod Eddington (full name: Sir Roderick Ian Eddington AO FTSE) is an Australian businessman. He is currently chair of the government body Infrastructure Australia and a director of News Corporation, continuing his long association with that company. He has served in other senior positions including as CEO of British Airways.
Coming from a country area where there were no high schools, Eddington went to Perth in 1963 to attend Christ Church Grammar School. He studied engineering at the University of Western Australia and graduated with first-class honors in 1972. He continued his studies at UWA and completed the degree of Master of Engineering.
In 1974, Eddington was the Rhodes Scholar from Western Australia. He completed his DPhil in the Department of Engineering Science at Oxford University and played eight first-class cricket matches for Oxford in 1975 and 1976. He was President of Vincent’s Club in 1977.
Eddington joined the Swire Group in 1979, working for its subsidiary Cathay Pacific, before being appointed Managing Director in 1992. Continuing his association with the airline industry; News Limited, a subsidiary of News Corporation, appointed Eddington Chairman of Ansett Australia in January 1997, four years before the airline failed.
News Corp had taken control of the airline with TNT in 1979. Eddington was appointed Deputy Chairman of News Limited in September 1998. He was further promoted to the News Corporation board in September 1999. In a timely maneuver, News Corporation sold off Ansett; the airline eventually became insolvent in 2001 partly as a result of the overall difficulties in the airline industry following the 9/11 terror attacks.
Eddington managed to escape blame for the poor financial state of the airline, apparently aided by his board membership of News Corporation, as others were loath to criticize him publicly.
The blame for the collapse has tended to be worn by Air New Zealand management, who bought the airline from News Corporation in 2000 without significant experience in managing large point-to-point short and medium-haul domestic networks.
Prior to Ansett’s placement into Administration by the Air New Zealand Management, Eddington had successfully met most targets to turn Ansett’s misfortune around and some critics believe the airline was not technically insolvent after all.
Rod Eddington Age | How old is Rod Eddington?
Sir Roderick Ian Eddington AO FTSE is an Australian businessman. He is currently chair of the government body Infrastructure Australia and a director of News Corporation, continuing his long association with that company. He has served in other senior positions including as CEO of British Airways. He was born on January 2, 1950 (age 69 years old as of 2019), Perth, Australia
Rod Eddington Government Reports
Transport Study in Britain. On 1 December 2006, Eddington published a UK government-sponsored report into the future of Britain’s transport infrastructure. The Eddington Transport Study set out the case for action to improve road and rail networks, as a “crucial enabler of sustained productivity and competitiveness”.
The report’s main conclusions were that Britain has transport networks that provide the right connections, in the right places, to support the journeys that matter to economic performance. But roads, in particular, were in serious danger of becoming so congested, the economy would suffer.
At the launch of the report, Eddington told journalists and transport industry representatives introducing road pricing to encourage drivers to drive less was an “economic no-brainer”. There was, he said “no attractive alternative”. It would cut congestion by half by 2025, and bring benefits to the British economy totaling £28b.
The report also called for a program of improvements to existing road and rail networks, the expansion of key airports, and adoption of the general principle that travelers should pay for the external costs of the pollution and congestion the cause of their journey.
Transport Study in Victoria, Australia
Eddington has since delivered a report to the Victorian Government of Australia, the East-West Link Needs Assessment report, which was met with mixed reactions. Economic commentators criticized the cost-benefit ratios of Eddington’s proposals, which on Eddington’s own analysis were marginal at best.
Rod Eddington Net Worth And Salary
Sir Roderick Ian Eddington is Independent Non-Executive Director of CLP Holdings Ltd., since January 1, 2006. He was the 1974 Rhodes Scholar at the University of Western Australia. He completed a D Phil in the Department of Engineering Science at Oxford University.
He is the Non-executive Chairman (Australia and New Zealand) of JP Morgan Chase Bank N.A. and a Non-executive Director of 21st Century Fox (split from News Corporation) and John Swire & Sons Pty Ltd. He is the Chairman of Lion Pty Ltd. since 1 April 2012.
Sir Rod Eddington was the Chief Executive of British Airways plc from 2000 until he retired on 30 September 2005. He has close connections with Hong Kong through his previous directorships with Cathay Pacific Airways Ltd., Swire Pacific Ltd., and Hong Kong Aircraft Engineering Company Ltd.
during the period from 1988 to 1996. As the Independent Non-Executive Director of CLP, the total compensation of Roderick Eddington at CLP is $854,108. There are 17 executives at CLP getting paid more, with Catherine Tanna having the highest compensation of $33,900,000.
British Airways CEO
Eddington replaced former BA CEO Bob Ayling on 2 May 2000. He removed many aspects of Ayling’s corporate relaunch in early 2001: the unpopular ethnic-art tailfins were changed back to the traditional Union Jack tailfin.
He steered the company in the aftermath of the 11 September 2001 attacks on New York City and Washington D.C. which proved disastrous for many other airlines.
Following a loss of £200m in 2002, Eddington’s “Future Size and Shape” cost-cutting program allowed BA to report a profit of £135m in 2003, despite a decrease in turnover. Eddington declared: “These are good results in one of the toughest years in living memory”, and while this can be expected from a CEO trying to reassure investors, it was against a climate of the Iraq War and SARS.
The decision to permanently retire the British Airways Concorde in 2003 was made by Eddington, and his action remains highly controversial.
Eddington stood down as Chief Executive Officer of British Airways on 30 September 2005, after more than five years in the position. He then returned to Australia to take up a position as the head of the Victorian Major Events Association, succeeding Steve Vizard.
Eddington was replaced by Willie Walsh in October 2005 after he had followed a six-month shadow position.
Eddington received a knighthood in 2005 for services to the aviation industry.
Career As A Company Director
As of February 2006, Eddington was a non-executive board member of JPMorgan – Non-Executive Chairman For Australia And New Zealand
News Corporation – non-executive director of publicly listed Delaware, United States, the based company John Swire & Sons Pty Ltd. – non-executive director of Australian proprietary subsidiary of Hong Kong-based privately held company, John Swire & Sons (H.K.) Ltd.
Rio Tinto Group – non-executive director of both publicly listed companies in the group Eddington also served on the board of Allco Finance Group, where he was one of three non-executive directors to approve Allco’s ill-fated acquisition of Rubicon Holdings.
A previously-announced plan for Eddington to become Chairman of ANZ Banking Group of Australia and New Zealand was first delayed from February 2009 to February 2010; then finally scuttled on 9 August 2009. It is possible that his Directorship of scandal-plagued Rio Tinto Group made such a position for him at ANZ untenable, as corporate espionage by Rio Tinto against the Chinese Government is at issue.
In 2012 he was appointed an Officer of the Order of Australia (AO) “for distinguished service to business and commerce through roles with a range of national and international economic, trade, infrastructure development, and transport organizations”, and was also elected a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering.
Rod Rosenbladt Photo
Rod Eddington Wife, Married
The setting is apt. Sir Rod maintains a strong affinity with Asia, where he worked for a large part of his life and married Korean-born Young Sook, whom he met in Hong Kong. He clearly knows his way around the menu and speaks fluent Japanese, chatting amiably to the waitresses and ordering miso soup for starters. Asia is also the first thing on the menu when it comes to our conversation.
Sir Rod, 64, has just returned from the region, where he was part of Tony Abbott ’s trade mission that helped lock in long-overdue trade deals with Japan and South Korea. He is clearly excited.
“I lived in Korea for a couple of years and my wife is Korean so I am delighted to see that. We now have a much-improved trading arrangement with two of our three major trading partners. I don’t describe these things like free-trade agreements but a freer trading agreement. It is a really important step,” he says.
Sir Rod wears many hats, and it is hard to know where to begin. The Rhodes scholar who grew up in the Western Australian bush went on to run Cathay Pacific, Ansett, and British Airways.
He chairs JPMorgan Australia and beverages giant Lion Group, which is owned by Japan’s Kirin, while juggling directorships at News Corp, Hong Kong’s China Light & Power, John Swire & Sons and previously Rio Tinto.
He also served on the board of Allco Finance Group, which became the country’s most high-profile corporate collapse during the financial crisis.
He was knighted in Britain in 2005 for his services to aviation. Running airlines invariably means getting entwined in politics; Sir Rod manages to straddle both sides of the fence, advising former foreign minister Alexander Downer in the 1990s and more recently working for Kevin Rudd as Infrastructure Australia chairman. He has now accepted an invitation from the PM to sit on the APEC Business Advisory Council.