David Neeleman

David G. Neeleman
Born	October 16, 1959 (age 51) São Paulo, Brazil
Occupation	CEO Azul Airlines Brazil, Founder & former chairman, JetBlue Airways
Religion	The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
Spouse	Vicki Neeleman

David G. Neeleman (born October 16, 1959) is the founder and former CEO of JetBlue Airways and also founder of Azul Linhas Aéreas Brasileiras.

Biography

Neeleman was born in São Paulo, Brazil, and raised in the United States, to a family of Dutch and North American descent. He lived in Brazil until he was five.He attended Brighton High School in Cottonwood Heights, Utah, and attended the University of Utah for three years before dropping out. He served a mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

He co-founded (with June Morris) Morris Air, a low-fare charter airline, and from 1984 to 1988, he was executive vice president of the company. In 1988 Neeleman assumed the helm of Morris Air as its president. Then when Morris Air was acquired by Southwest Airlines for $130 million in 1993, he worked for a short time on their Executive Planning Committee.

After leaving Southwest, Neeleman became the CEO of Open Skies, a touch screen airline reservation and check-in systems company, later acquired by HP in 1999. At the same time, he helped with another upstart airline, WestJet.

As the CEO of JetBlue Airways, his 2002 salary was $200,000 with a bonus of $90,000. Neeleman donated his entire salary to the JetBlue Crewmember Crisis Fund, which was established for JetBlue employees who fall on hard times.

On May 10, 2007, David Neeleman was replaced by David Barger as CEO of JetBlue and on May 21, 2008 he was replaced as chairman of the board by Joel Peterson.

On March 27, 2008 Neeleman officially announced plans to launch a new airline, Azul (Portuguese for "blue"), a domestic carrier in Brazil. Neeleman asked to step down as the chairman of the board from JetBlue Airways to spend time starting this new venture, which he did in 2009.

Personal

Neeleman lives with his wife Vicki in New Canaan, Connecticut, United States. They are the parents of nine children. In 2000, he disclosed to CNN that he has adult attention-deficit disorder.

He is the 2005 recipient of the Tony Jannus Award fonnoutstanding leadership in the commercial aviation industry.

He speaks fluent Portuguese and holds both U.S. and Brazilian citizenship.

(source:wikipedia)

David Barger

David Barger
David Barger after a October 2010 presentation in Ann Arbor, Michigan
Born	David J. Barger 1958 (age 52–53)
Citizenship	United States
Alma mater	University of Michigan
Occupation	President and CEO of JetBlue
Salary	US$591,667 + US$888,455 other compensation (2009)
Spouse	Eliza A. Arpey

David J. Barger (born 1958) is the current President and the Chief Executive Officer of JetBlue Airways.He was part of JetBlue's founding team and is on the corporation's board of directors.

Career

Dave Barger's interest in airlines came from his father, who was a United Airlines pilot for 37 years. From 1982 to 1988, Barger served in a number of positions with New York Air, such as the Director of Stations. In 1992 he joined with Continental Airlines and held various management positions including Vice President of Continental's Newark Liberty International Airport hub.

Barger was part of the JetBlue Airways founding team in 1998, and served as the Chief Operating Officer for Jet Blue until March 2007. During the airline's first months of operation, when a JetBlue plane was forced to stop en route so that a diabetic passenger could receive emergency care, Barger reportedly personally apologized to each passenger for the delay, and offered a free flight as compensation. Following a February 2007 incident in which the airline was forced to cancel nearly 1,700 flights due to winter storms, JetBlue's board of directors replaced Chief Executive Officer David Neeleman. Barger, then 49, became JetBlue's new Chief Executive Officer on May 10, 2007.Neeleman, the company's largest individual investor, became a nonexecutive chairman as a result of the change.On June 1, 2009, Barger became the president of JetBlue.

Charitable work

Barger is on both the executive committee and the board of governors of the Flight Safety Foundation, an independent nonprofit organization dedicated to the field of air safety.[10] In 2007, Barger gave $4.5 million USD to the Barger Leadership Institute in the Organizational Studies Program in the College of Literature, Science and the Arts at the University of Michigan.

(source:wikipedia)