Boeing China president named

Boeing has named company veteran John Bruns president of Boeing China, effective July 1. He will be based in Beijing.

As president of Boeing China, Bruns, 51, will serve as Boeing’s senior in-country executive and lead company-wide activities. He will be responsible for expanding Boeing’s local presence, for managing business partnerships, government affairs, and corporate citizenship. He will also develop and implement Boeing’s China strategy focused on new growth and productivity initiatives and relationships with customers and stakeholders in this key market.

Bruns succeeds Ian Thomas, who is leaving Boeing in July for a senior role with a technology company based in California.

Prior to this appointment, Bruns served as senior sales director for Northeast Asia, Boeing Commercial Airplanes. He joined McDonnell Douglas in 1986 and worked in Engineering Test & Evaluation. In 1990, he was assigned to the McDonnell Douglas China Program Office in Long Beach, and then moved to Beijing in 1994 as deputy to the president of McDonnell Douglas/China. After the merger between Boeing and McDonnell Douglas in 1997, Bruns joined the Boeing Commercial Airplanes Sales organization and led numerous successful airplane sales campaigns with Chinese airlines and leasing companies. Bruns was assigned to Beijing for a second time from 2007 to 2015.