AirPlus managing director Patrick Diemer will leave the company at the end of this year, the company announced. He'll be replaced by Oliver Wagner, who currently serves as chief commercial officer for Eurowings, the low-cost carrier owned by AirPlus parent Lufthansa Group. Diemer, who has been with AirPlus since 2003, will leave the company "at his own request" when his contract expires, according to the company.
Wagner joined Lufthansa Group in 1995, holding management positions in areas including frequent flyer programs, network management, revenue management, customer experience and product, as well as marketing and customer relations. When he takes over for Diemer on Jan. 1, 2020, Wagner will join AirPlus co-managing director Andreas Hagenbring, who was promoted to the position in June 2018.
Diemer's accomplishments in his 16 years at AirPlus include successfully leading the company through rough waters in 2016, when it lost revenue and cardholders due to the imposition of regulation capping interchange fees in Europe. He also helmed the rollout of AirPlus' A.I.D.A. virtual card product to more than a dozen countries and was a leading industry voice in lobbying European Union lawmakers to carve out corporate lodge and virtual cards from EU security standards mandating two-factor customer payment authentication—a well-intentioned anti-fraud measure that threatened to wreak havoc on managed travel.