The Global Business Travel Association (GBTA) has hired Suzanne Neufang as its next executive director, leading the combined GBTA and the Association of Corporate Travel Executives (ACTE).
Neufang, whose diverse executive career has included senior leadership roles with several high-profile travel and technology companies, most recently served as senior vice president-Americas for HRS Global Hotel Solutions.
Before HRS, Neufang worked for 10 years as an executive leader with Sabre Travel Network, GetThere and Travelocity and later as a divisional chief marketing officer for Fortune 500 software giant Intuit. An active member of GBTA since 2005, Neufang led ACTE as board president from 2012 to 2014 and as a board member from 2014 to 2018. She also served as ACTE’s interim executive director during summer 2012.
“It’s not a secret that business travel is at an historic low point as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic, but in crises we find opportunities to be bold and to excel,” said Neufang in a press statement.
“Business travel has been down before and we have recovered – always coming back more technologically savvy, data-focused, and globally connected. The key questions for me are when we as an industry will recover, and how we as GBTA can drive economic and industry recovery to be even faster.
“We need to emerge from this pandemic as a healthier, more transparent association, one with the strongest possible, globally-focused foundation.”
Neufang will take over on February 24 from Dave Hilfman, who since July 2020 has served as GBTA’s interim executive director. Hilfman will remain with GBTA in a temporary consulting role to smoothen the transition.
