BA loses e-guru to property website

British Airways has suffered a blow with the resignation of its head of e-business just months after unveiling a £100m group-wide internet strategy.

British Airways has suffered a blow with the resignation of its head of e-business just months after unveiling a £100m group-wide internet strategy.

Simon Harford, who alongside Barbara Cassani co-founded BA's low-cost carrier, Go, has quit BA to become a director and chief financial officer at propertyfinder.co.uk, an online house-hunting site.

His departure comes just over a month after Great Universal Stores, the Burberry-to-Argos retailer, parted company with its e-commerce director, Michael de Kare-Silver.

Commenting on his decision, Mr Harford said: "BA has not abandoned its internet strategy ... I just felt it was time for me to get back into an entrepreneurial environment."

A BA spokeswoman said: "Simon's role when he was here was as "the vision". He was responsible for setting up [our e-commerce strategy] and making sure that "e" was at the heart of everything we did."

She added that it had been Mr Harford's decision to leave and he would not be replaced.