Addendum
China Airlines employees mourn chairman’s sudden passing
February 1st 2025
China Airlines and Mandarin Airlines chairman, Su-Chien Hsieh (72), who successfully led the airline group through the pandemic followed by CAL’s best financial performance in its history (US$618.9 million profit), died of a heart attack at Taipei Veterans General Hospital in January. Read More » An airline statement said his passing was “a tremendous loss for China Airlines and that his contributions and achievements will be indelibly engraved in the history of the airline”.
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Hsieh joined the finance division of China Airlines in 1979 after graduating in economics from Soochow University. He began his 46-year career with the flag carrier in the finance department working his way up the corporate ladder in Kaohsiung as well as Taipei, in Australia and Indonesia postings, as head of the group’s Taiwan Air Cargo Terminals and as a senior vice president.
He was appointed president of CAL in 2016 and chairman in April 2019.
Hsieh was widely praised for a management style that valued employees as the company’s most important asset, a quality that largely contributed to the airline’s impressive post-pandemic revenue performance.
At the time of his passing, Hsieh was the longest serving CAL chairman not to have served in Taiwan’s air force.
CAL president, Kao Shing-hwang, is acting CAL chairman. The airline group also owns Mandarin Airlines and LCC Tigerair Taiwan.
