Cathay Pacific appoints Abhijit Abhyankar as regional head of people at SAMEA

June 25, 2021: The Hong Kong-based airline, Cathay Pacific, has appointed Abhijit Abhyankar as the airline’s new regional head of people in South Asia, the Middle East and Africa (SAMEA) and during his tenure at the company and will be stationed in Mumbai.

He will be heading the people team and will be responsible for human resource strategy and execution, internal stakeholder management and collaboration, talent management and succession planning, employee engagement, people cost budgeting and business continuity.

Abhijit Abhyankar said, “At Cathay Pacific, we believe our employees are the key drivers of our business. We aim to provide our people with an environment in which they are able to flourish with us. Our culture, the work environment as well as the dedicated specialised programmes like Cathay Women’s network, Fly With Pride Network, encourages our employees to take pride in being a part of Cathay Pacific, further driving them to deliver their best for our business.”

Born in Mumbai, India, Abhijit has over 21 years of experience in the hospitality and aviation sector. Abhyankar joined the Hong Kong-based Airlines in November 2009. After his earlier roles as corporate sales manager and area sales manager, Northern India, he was appointed regional marketing communications manager for South Asia in October 2014. Thereafter, in October 2018, he went on to head marketing and direct channel sales designated as regional head of marketing and digital sales for the South Asia, Middle East and Africa (SAMEA) based in Mumbai, India. He was leading the marketing strategy, direct channel sales, customer contact support. In June 2020, he was appointed as the country manager for Africa and the Indian Ocean and was responsible for the growth of the airline’s business and operations in the region.