Norwegian Air’s board fires chief executive Jacob Schram

Norwegian Air Shuttle has fired its CE and replaced him with the finance director who led the restructuring that rescued the low-cost airline from the brink of collapse. The airline said on Monday that its board had voted to end Jacob Schram’s time as chief executive with immediate effect and replace him with the well-regarded Geir Karlsen. Despite the board’s efforts to reduce Schram’s pay-off to what it called “a level reflecting the challenges of the industry”, he will receive two years’ salary. Norwegian has cut its debt significantly through a large-scale financial restructuring in Ireland and Norway after it expanded too quickly and was hit by the Covid-19 pandemic. It has abandoned its lossmaking long-haul operations and will focus more on its Nordic home market and flights from there to the rest of Europe. Svein Harald Oygard, Norwegian’s chair, said Karlsen was the board’s choice to try to finish the turnround as Covid travel bans look set to ease across Europe. “In parallel, further efforts will be made to strengthen Norwegian’s position as a low-cost airline and to return the company to sustainable profitability. Geir is the ideal CEO to lead these efforts,” he added. Karlsen, who has been Norwegian’s CFO since April 2018, was acting CE for five months in 2019 following the departure of founder Bjorn Kjos.<br/>