Burlington, WTC Executives to Merge Into Management Team

Executives from Burlington Air Express of Irvine and WTC International of Newport Beach will form aseparate holding company whose management will act as the senior management team for the two firms. Burlington is owned by Pittston Co., which is acquiring WTC this week.

WTC stockholders voted Monday to approved the acquisition by Pittston. The transaction, in which WTC will sell substantially all of its assets to Pittston for .523 shares of Pittston stock for each share of WTC common stock and Pittston will assume WTC’s liabilities, is expected to close Wednesday. WTC shares will continue to trade on the American Stock Exchange until Sept. 3, and the Pittston shares then will be distributed to WTC stockholders of record on that date and WTC will be wound up and dissolved.

In the management reorganization, Robin H.H. Wilson, Burlington’s president and chief executive officer, will take the same positions in the as-yet unnamed holding company, which will be located in Burlington’s offices.

Two WTC officials--Roger MacFarlane and Peter Thorrington-Smith, who together own more than two-thirds of the WTC stock--will be executive vice presidents, along with Burlington official David Siegfried.

WTC officer Chris Nissen will be a senior vice president along with Thomas F. Murrill of Burlington and Robert Arovas, an officer of Pittston, a diversified Greenwich, Conn., company.

Steven L. Benjamin, a Burlington vice president, will hold the same position in the new company.

Burlington and WTC will continue for now as separate entities with separate operational managers and staffs, a Pittston spokesman said.