ChevronTexaco Corp. vice chairman Glenn Tilton is slated to take over as chief executive officer of United Airlines parent UAL Corp., and is expected to be named to the post at a special Labor Day meeting of the UAL board.
United declined to comment on the issue, which was first reported by the Wall Street Journal on Saturday. The Journal said Tilton had the board's unanimous support going into the meeting.
The move would take Tilton, 54, from one troubled company to another. ChevronTexaco in May dispatched the executive to serve as interim chairman of Dynegy Inc., an energy trading firm in which ChevronTexaco has a big stake. Dynegy is scrambling for cash, socked by questions over its accounting and problems in a sector wracked by the collapse of Enron. In the most recent quarter, Dynegy lost $328 million, and ChevronTexaco wrote off as a permanent loss some $531 million in Dynegy loans and stock.
United has its own share of troubles. The airline has had a falloff in travel in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks and corporate travel cutbacks spurred by the economic downturn. United announced last month it will file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy unless it can quickly slash routes and cut pay for its workers.
Carol Freedenthal, of Houston's Jofree Energy Consulting, said Tilton is likely making the move because he has little power or responsibility inside either ChevronTexaco or Dynegy. Tilton is former CEO of Texaco Inc., which was purchased by Chevron Corp. in a $37.5 billion deal in October.
At Dynegy, Tilton was part of a crowded executive suite that also included interim CEO Daniel Dienstbier and president and chief operating officer Steve Bergstrom. Freedenthal also said it is unclear whether ChevronTexaco plans to continue to support Dynegy's operations, giving Tilton another reason to jump ship.
Tilton could not be reached for comment. ChevronTexaco, which is now based in San Francisco but is moving its corporate headquarters to San Ramon sometime this year, declined to comment.
Tilton started his career at Texaco in 1970, fresh out of the University of South Carolina, according to company literature. He served as a sales trainee and worked his way up through various marketing positions. By 1987, he was vice president of marketing for Texaco U.S.A., by 1992 president of Texaco Europe, by 1994 president of Texaco U.S.A. and chairman and CEO of the parent company by 2001, just before its merger with Chevron.
United labor leaders greeted Tilton's appointment with guarded optimism Sunday. "It would be a positive development," said Rich Bourque, president of Air Transport Employees Local 1781, which represents mechanics, customer service workers, ramp workers and security personnel at San Francisco, San Jose and Oakland airports. "There's going to have to be a reaching-out CEO to develop trust and a belief that they want the employees to have careers at United and that they want to have the best damn airline going."
"All they need to do is to demonstrate to the employees that the employees are the true assets of the company -- All we've heard for years is, when profits are good, 'You have to wait your turn,' and when they are bad, they want givebacks."
United, which is the Bay Area's largest airline, is seeking wage cuts of about 10 percent for the types of workers represented by Bourque's local.
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