Currently, McArthur is group executive for Virgin Australia Regional Airlines (VARA) and Virgin Australia Cargo.
She will commence her new role on May 7 2018, Virgin Australia said in a statement on Wednesday.
Tigerair Australia executive manager flight operations Peter Wilson has been the LCC’s acting chief executive since June 30 2017, when Rob Sharp was called up to head office to run Virgin Australia airlines following the sudden departure of John Thomas.
Virgin Australia chief executive John Borghetti said McArthur brought a “wealth of experience” to the position.
“Merren has done an outstanding job in transforming and strengthening both the VARA and Cargo businesses and I am confident that she will make an invaluable contribution in this new role,” Borghetti said in a statement.
McArthur has been at Virgin Australia since 2008, when she joined the company as its general counsel and later as group executive for alliances, network planning and revenue management.
The refleeting exercise was first announced in July 2016, with Virgin Australia saying at the time Tigerair Australia would become an all-Boeing 737 operator within three years.
Virgin Australia said in February Tigerair Australia had 14 A320s and three 737-800s in its fleet at December 31 2017. The fleet is unchanged from June 30 2017, according to Virgin Australia’s 2016/17 full year results presentation.
“Given that we have shown good progress on that, our intention is concurrently turning to the A320 program,” Smith said.
“Definitely it has already commenced and it will be continuing to the back end of that third year of the program and into the fourth.”
Tigerair Australia’s 14 A320s are leased aircraft.
There is also the question of whether Tigerair Australia will resume international operations.
The LCC started flights from Adelaide, Melbourne and Perth to Bali in March 2016 with three 737-800s that were painted in Tigerair Australia livery but operated by Virgin Australia pilots.
However, Tigerair Australia was forced to permanently withdraw from Bali in February 2017 after reaching an impasse with Indonesian regulators over its permits to serve the popular Indonesian tourist hotspot.
It was the airline’s only international destination.
Asked at the Routes Asia 2018 conference in Brisbane on Monday when Tigerair Australia would fly internationally, Sharp said “at the moment its focus is on bringing a big fleet change in”.
“For Tigerair this reinvestment stage over the next couple of years will reinvigorate its product, lower its cost base, increase its revenue and that’s its focus at the moment. It’s quite a complex program,” Sharp said.
“Tiger has nothing to announce in terms of international at the moment. It still does remain on the agenda, but for the moment it is really around that major fleet change.”
#VirginAustralia group executive for airlines Rob Sharp is speaking on day two of #RoutesAsia 2018 conference in Brisbane pic.twitter.com/YHQnWg6z78
— World of Aviation (@the_wofa) March 18, 2018
Separately, Virgin Australia said VARA head of flight operations Mark Davey would take on the role of VARA executive general manager.
A new cargo boss has not been named.
