If you think that any company these days is a job for life then I'm afraid you are condemned to a life of misery. All companies retrench, refocus and adjust their staffing from time to time. I get that managing a corporate entity is quite a different issue from flying a plane, so I understand that you may not comprehend this. But as someone who has had P&L responsibility for business units with hundreds of millions of US$ revenue I do get it. (And, yes, I was laid off twice in my career - that's the way capitalism works. No big deal)

Hmmm, onto my seventh CEO of my CX career. Don't feel to bad for RH, he'll slink way with millions of shareholders money. In a proper capitalist system he wouldn't have risen too far, but in the incestuous Swire empire the curdled cream does tend to rise to the top. We still have the feckless and craven JS at the helm of Swire, so there will be no real change (of course). This airline is in disarray from one end to the other, and its day is done. Stay for chaos and misery if you wish, but you will never have a stable and rewarding career here ever again. You can bank on it.

Also, time to realise that CX never sold out to the Chicoms, the Chicoms simply have come in and effectively taken the airline. The new CEO and number 2 are basically in the back pocket of Beijing, and will do exactly what they want, no matter what the Swire board or HK regulators want. CX is now a surrogate mainland airline, and the management will now jump when Beijing barks. Sad day.

According to CNN Rupert Hogg and Richard Loo resigned.

Er, yes. That is what the previous 22 posts in this thread have been about! (Albeit Paul Loo, not Richard)

Actually, with AC as the minority (but significant) shareholder the playbook now becomes obvious. The entire thing with CAAC was a set up. Bejing uses the whole shebang as an excuse to simply come in and grab the airline after it's done a bit of grabbing itself and fattened itself up a bit with some other deals.

True commie dooshbaggery at its finest. My hat's off to them.

Other biznesses should take note though. And I'm not sure Bejing knows what it's getting lol.

It is amazing that the state run airports/airlines just to the north had the ability to increase capacity before all this started, somehow they had the ability to predict the increase in market demand before it was there..Follow the money, the master performer draws audience attention to one thing to distract it from another. Anyone recall how this all started again ? that just does not seem to make the news anymore, dont see her resigning given the huge impact her conduct made on the Hong Kong economy. All the attention was on the police one week, an airline next week, wonder which industry that the mainlanders want next without paying, Will it be the banks for money laundering for the "terrorists", the phone companies for facilitating "terrorists" communications, the MTR for transporting "terrorists" ?

Meanwhile no one has actually been found guilty of an offence in the Hong Kong courts.

The reality is that the mainland is governed by a "Gangster Theocracy", and you have just witnessed it's power at first hand. If anyone thinks it will end here, they really should be out buying unicorns. Beijing has now finally taken the gloves off, and HK will NEVER be the same again. Of that you can be certain. Business in HK will now be under the malignant and unstoppable force of the mainlands heavy hand, and they will take what they want when they want. Effectively they've just taken CX. As to what this means for the younger expat employees...do you really need me to tell you what the future would hold for you here?

In your time of mourning, I would like to offer up a replacement for Cathay's loss of RH. I give you AC. Please take him. Just take him .....

Okay. RH sacrificed himself for Slosar I get it. But why Augustus Tang? Haven't they learned a lesson of appointing a Hongkie to be their CEO? Or perhaps this is exactly the future of CX? If so, why not pick Algernon Yau? At least he is much more credible than AT IMOP.

AT is in until a new CEO can be announced from what I read somewhere...

The week that Cathay Pacific surrendered to China

CNN Business review
https://edition.cnn.com/2019/08/16/b...ina/index.html

Or...

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/b...jing-plqrkgcvq

The Western political establishment lived in a fairy land.
Echoing around houses of Parliament for decades was the mantra that a modernised China would be a freer China.
Western consumers bought endless piles of Chinese junk, ignoring the reality of tyranny.

In the antipodes, hordes of mainland students intimidate Hong Kong supporters, University Chancellors ignore the abuse, while consular staff applaud the violence in another country.

Cathay Pacific didn't even fight.
Imagine if crew were detained in the mainland?

This is only beginning. HK will never be the same again. CX will never be the same again. Can anyone envision a stable, prosperous career here going forward? Seriously? Anyone?

CCTV could have made this statement
" It accused the airline of having "flawed" professional ethics"
years ago if it took any notice of all the breaches of HK Labour laws.

Ok Oasis, bla bla all you like. If you don't think HK has moved into a permanent twilight zone (and certainly different from anything over the past 20 yrs), you haven't been paying attention. MM is correct, this is a game changer, and HK will certainly not be the same again. Beijing is going to make certain of that. Only the beginning.