Turboprop maker ATR announced on September 24, 2026, that its board of directors has appointed Vittorio Lorenzo Della Bella as the new Chief Executive Officer (CEO), effective November 1, 2026.
Della Bella succeeds Nathalie Tarnaud Laude, who has headed ATR since 2022.
The Italian executive joins ATR from Leonardo Helicopters US, where he served as president. Della Bella boasts a long career in aerospace, particularly within the helicopter industry.
He has previously held the posts of Senior Vice-President Customer Support, Services & Training at Leonardo Helicopters and Managing Director at NHIndustries, the European consortium building the NH90 military helicopters.
In parallel to the top leadership change, Patrick Bergues, who was Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of Airbus in the US, has been announced as ATR’s new CFO, also effective November 1, 2026. Bergues will replace Italian executive, Andrea Coccetti, who will moving back to the Leonardo group.
These changes must be understood in the context of ATR’s corporate governance rules, which set a fixed four-year term for the company’s CEO.
Since Airbus and Leonardo each hold half of the shares in the joint venture, leadership appointments aim to balance the representation of the two parties. When Tarnaud-Laude took over the reins of ATR in September 2022, she replaced Stefano Bortoli, a Leonardo veteran, who had served since 2018.
ATR’s new CEO will face the challenge of continuing the industrial streamlining program started by Tarnaud-Laude, as she sought to fix lingering supply chain issues and scale up production and deliveries. Also within the next four years, Della Bella will have to make key decisions regarding the EVO program, ATR’s new generation turboprop development program, which is expected to enter service by the start of the next decade and will likely involve some form of hybrid propulsion.