Stellar Labs Appoints Vicki Nakata as Chief Executive Officer

BURLINGAME, CA – March 6, 2020 – Stellar Labs today announced that its board of directors has appointed Vicki Nakata as Chief Executive Officer, effective immediately. 

Nakata succeeds David Fox, who, after co-founding and seeing Stellar through six years of remarkable growth, will transition to the role of Stellar’s Chairman of the Board. As chairman, Fox will focus on long-term strategic initiatives for the company.

“It has been an honor and a privilege to serve as the CEO of Stellar, and I am incredibly proud of everything our team has accomplished together,” said Fox. “Our success is founded upon our core values, foremost of which is making customers successful. I look forward to my new role as Chairman of the Board and am confident the Stellar team with Vicki leading the way will continue to take our success to the next level.” 

Speaking on behalf of the board, Stellar Board Director Dean Donovan said, “We wish to recognize the outstanding role David Fox has played to get Stellar to this point. We thank him for his tireless effort and dedication to building the Stellar business as founder and CEO. We see him making a new level of contribution to the company in his new role as Chairman.”

“The best time to make a change is when things are going well,” Donovan continued. “Stellar will play an important role enabling business aviation with technology.  We are thrilled to have a leader with Vicki’s experience in aviation, customer relationship development, and business leadership take the helm at Stellar.”

“Stellar is a truly special company,” said Nakata. “We’re seeing significant momentum around the Stellar Marketplace with more and more operators and partners working with us to make business aviation simple, transparent and accessible. Our team’s technical and industry experience, as well as our commitment to customers, uniquely position Stellar to be a leading technology solution provider in business aviation.”

Nakata joined Stellar in April 2018, as Vice President of Business Development and Customer Success. She was named Chief Operating Officer in August 2019 and has overseen product management and design, marketing, customer success, business development, and strategic relationships. 

Prior to joining Stellar, Nakata had over 15 years of experience growing online travel businesses, developing and implementing business strategies, launching products and creating strategic partnerships. She held senior executive positions at Hawaiian Airlines and Booking.com and was a principal in the airline practice at Bain & Company. Nakata is a graduate of Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management and Amherst College.

About Stellar Labs

Stellar is reimagining and revolutionizing business aviation by building the Stellar Marketplace, an independent, business-to-business, online exchange for business aviation, and the industry’s most modern, web and mobile-based flight-operations platform. We’re bringing together advanced technologies to build a complete and innovative solution for operators, corporate flight departments, brokers and their customers. With a new technology platform, built from the ground up for this purpose, Stellar will drive transformative operational improvements in the business aviation sector, radically improving efficiency, profitability, and customer experience. Find out more at www.stellar.aero.