EBACE Show News - May 21, 2008 - (Page 56)

EBACE 2008 Jet Aviation Expands Under Peter Edwards Peter Edwards, Group CEO of Jet Aviation, has been in post for just over a year. Some high-profile resignations had occurred in the two-year period following private equity company Permira Funds’ 2005 buy-out of the family-owned Swiss firm, but Edwards took control and quickly steadied the ship. The number of new operations, acquisitions, and jvs he has announced in the past few months is spectacular by any industrial barometer, with Jet Aviation becoming the first western company to open FBO and maintenance operations in Moscow and Beijing. Another MoU was signed this month with Airod of Malaysia to open at Subang Airport, while in January Jet Aviation completed its acquisition of U.S.-based maintenance and completions company Savannah Air Center. At Moscow, the Vnukovo Invest agreement allows Jet Aviation to provide maintenance services at Vnukovo International Airport, making it the first global business aviation maintenance company to serve the growing business aviation community in Russia. “We initially looked at Domodedovo Airport, but Vnukovo 3 was the best opportunity for us, and the amount of business aircraft operations there is astonishing,” Edwards told Show News. He stressed that this is just the beginning and there is still a lot to do, and more services to be added. “There has been such a rapid movement of sales backlogs by the key OEMs into international markets that we didn’t have a lot of time to waste.” The Beijing operation, an FBO and line maintenance facility at Capital International Airport, is a jv with Deer Jet, a subsidiary of HNA Group of China. Handling and limited line maintenance services will be ready in time for this year’s Olympic Games. Edwards noted that the backdrop of this summer’s Olympics is overshadowing everything at the 56 moment. “It puts a severe timeline on everything we do there.” Priority one is to be ready to support the Olympics, when 400-500 business jets are expected to visit. Jet Aviation will fly in extra staff from its other FBOs to help out during this peak period. After the Games the company will get on with completing its Beijing business plan through 2008/09. “There’s a lot of growth here and we wanted to be there first. We will participate in that growth, and be a key facilitator in bringing the infrastructure that wasn’t there before. We also intend to enhance the air- Jet Aviation’s FBO at Beijing Capital International is a jv with Deer Jet. Jet Aviation CEO Peter Edwards. craft management business, which will be an important part of the mix in this joint venture,” said Edwards. Immediately after taking over at Jet Aviation, Edwards says he looked over every part of the business. “We looked at our geographical footprint and stepped back and re-thought the whole model. Systems were overhauled and key processes modernized. We just had to do things better to digest the level of increase in our core activities.” “We are continuing to look at India where more than 100 large cabin business aircraft are due to arrive over the next three to four years. We’ve formed no specific plans or intentions yet, but once we get our business development people clear of some of the current projects, we will re-focus on some of the obvious opportunities around the globe, and India would be very high on that list.” Jet Aviation has just opened its new widebody completions Hangar 7 at Basel, Switzerland, which is designed to hold an Airbus A380, plus an A340-sized aircraft and two ACJs/BBJs simultaneously. On A380 completions Edwards says, “We’re evaluating the A380 potential impact on our business mix at the moment, but haven’t formed any business conclusions yet.” It seems that the delay to Boeing’s 787 Dreamliner is positively helping Jet Aviation’s own completions backlog, and allowing other major work to fill in the gaps. Eight Dreamliners are earmarked as corporate widebodies. “Most of those are with us, and work extends out to 2016,” says Edwards. “Boeing has been quite good about sharing information with us, so we have fairly reliable tail-by-tail data. The right response is to fill gaps created by schedule movements with alternative projects that perhaps we were unable to address previously.” Edwards is particularly pleased with the integration of the Savannah Air Center, which was acquired in January, into his U.S. completions operation. “It’s not only gone incredibly well, but is exceeding our initial expectations. We now allocate aircraft between MidCoast and Savannah as capacity needs,” he notes. —Mike Vines Madrid Torrejon Timing Uncertain Madrid’s Torrejon NATO airfield is to be closed to business jet traffic, and all civil operations moved to Madrid-Getafe Airport (LEGT), 10 km from Madrid’s city center. The move, which was supposed to occur in June this year, has now been pushed back until September, but even this date seems in doubt as Madrid and Spanish government authorities seem unable to agree on a firm date. This indecisiveness is a planning nightmare for the Torrejon FBOs and handling companies, who will need notice to move their equipment to the new site and organize temporary operations buildings. Getafe is a civil airport with an 8,000 ft runway, and is home to an EADS/CASA factory as well as a Spanish Air Force training facility. It is unclear if Getafe is just a temporary solution while a permanent specialist business-only airport is built at El Alamo, 40-45 km southwest of Madrid. According to insiders, EL Alamo is four to five years away and in theory is to be largely privately funded. The problem, as we all know, —Mike Vines is getting the permissions to build a brand-new airport! May 21, 2008 www.aviationweek.com/shownews http://www.aviationweek.com/shownews

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of EBACE Show News - May 21, 2008

A318 Elite is on a Roll A Circle Around London P&WC Deliveries Triple Avanti Sees Sales Shift RUAG Eyes Needy Cabins Global Gets Even NICEr Embraer Beefs Up Support Honeywell ‘Virtual VFR’ Signature Europe Grows Gestair Seeks to Double Aero-Dienst Turns 50 Gama Doubles in Size All is Not Woe with Oil Ocean Sky is Aggressive

EBACE Show News - May 21, 2008

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