Fedex Freight president and chief executive officer Michael L. Ducker will retire effective Aug. 15, 2018, concluding a decades-long career with the company.

Ducker took the hem of FedEx Freight in 2014 and has spent more than 40 years at FedEx and its subsidiaries.

Joining FedEx Express in 1975, his first position was in the company’s frontline operations at the Memphis Hub. Rising through the ranks, he accepted his first international assignment as vice president of Southern Europe, where he was based in Milan, Italy, in 1991.

He became the vice president of the South Pacific and Middle East region in 1992, and then senior vice president of the Asia/Pacific region in 1995.

Ducker returned to the U.S. in 1999 as executive vice president/president, International. In 2009, he also became the chief operating officer of FedEx Express before assuming his current role at FedEx Freight.

“For more than 43 years, Mike Ducker has answered the call when FedEx asked him to lead in each new opportunity and role. Whether in Europe, Asia or the Americas, Mike has been a model of our People-Service-Profit philosophy. His leadership and strategic instinct have been integral in growing the global business we have today,” said Frederick W. Smith, FedEx Corp. chairman and chief executive officer. “There is no way to pinpoint his greatest accomplishment, but I can tell you it is hard to imagine FedEx without Mike Ducker, and that is the mark of a truly transformational leader.”