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THE EXECUTIVE LIFE
DINING OUT	FREQUENT FLYER	TOP PICKS

FLIGHT TIME ON A COPORATE JET

BY Matthew Carrington

Nothing says success like arriving for dinner in a private jet. Except, perhaps, arriving for dinner in a private jet, but with the $20 million plus cost of the jet still in the bank and earning interest. Fortunately for those who like to keep their capital right where it is and still play with the big boys, there’s a way of doing just this. Chartered corporate jets are hardly new to the international market, but on the heels of last month’s AVEX air show in Sharm Al Sheikh, it seems that changes are coming to the way it’s done in Egypt. Options are expanding and service is improving.

There is, of course, a whole list of arguments for switching away from commercial flights to chartered private jets that goes beyond the simple prestige involved. A private jet saves time by cutting out check-in requirements and makes your trip more efficient by landing at the airport nearest your destination rather than the closest hub. More importantly, flight times are based on your schedule, not the airline’s.

One of the older options when it comes to chartering a corporate jet in Egypt is provided by tour operator Travco Group, purveyors for the last 25 years of everything from golf tours to diving packages. The company’s air charter affiliate, Travco Air, offers business clients a 2002 Cessna Citation Bravo, which seats seven passengers and flies to destinations in the Middle East, Africa and Europe.

The Citation is a relatively cheap aircraft – you can pick up the type of plane being flown by Travco for around $5 million these days – but whether this is reflected in the charges that Travco levies for its use may be up to the negotiating skills of the individual customer. Business Monthly was quoted a round figure of $3,000 per hour, which only sounds like a lot until you hear what the others are asking.

Of course, price is the last reason that anyone chooses to fly this way.

As Captain Magdy Wahby, Travco’s flight dispatcher puts it, their customers include jetsetters and rich tourists, “but mainly the businessman who cares about his time... this is the main factor in business jets, time.”

And here, with only three hours’ notice required for a domestic departure and around six for international (subject, naturally, to the plane not already being booked), Travco excels. Once off the ground, the Citation, though not as fast as some of the pricier planes, can be in Sharm in an hour or Milan in about four.

Wahby, meanwhile, says that the company plans to have a newer, larger and faster Citation Sovereign at work by July.

One interesting alternative to Travco’s small jet is Orca Air’s Saab 340a. Substantially larger than the Citation, the Saab is driven by two turbo props rather than the Cessna’s twin jet engines, which makes it a little slower, but also a lot cheaper, relative to its size, to operate. The result is a lot more plane for about the same price. Instead of crawling into a cabin less than 5 feet high, Saab passengers stroll onboard with a full 6 feet of headroom. And instead of being able to take only your six essential team members with you on the Cessna, the Saab’s 34-seat capacity allows you to take the whole department, their secretaries and everyone’s luggage. If luxury is more important than numbers, however, they also have an executive conversion for the Saab that brings the seating capacity down to seven.

The drawback on this option is turnaround time. Orca Air is primarily a tourist charter company operating five Saabs and three large aircraft. And while they stress flexibility in organization, if you want the full executive accoutrements in the Saab they’re going to need a good four weeks’ notice to get the leather furniture and crystal chandeliers installed. For those with a little forward-planning, however, the wait just might be worth it.

The other relatively big charter option in Egypt is provided by Petroleum Air Services (PAS), which has a small fleet of Bombardier Dash 8s. This fixed-wing workhorse, however, only slightly bigger than Orca Air’s Saab, charges out at more than double the price, at around $6,000 per hour, without offering any particular advantage.

A more interesting executive option might be one of their eight Bell 412 EPs, the biggest and most comfortable of their 26-helicopter fleet. Chief pilot Ahmed Farag says the 13-passenger 412 EP can make the run to Sharm in about two hours, twice the flight time of the Citation or the Saab and half the comfort, but with the option of doing some “low and slow” sightseeing en route. He put the price tag of such a jaunt at around $10,000, or about 40 percent higher than a similar trip in either Travco’s Cessna or Orca’s Saab.

One unfortunate fact to keep in mind when considering a PAS helicopter as an alternative to a fixed-wing craft is that the main advantage of the helicopter – that it doesn’t need a runaway to land and take off – is undercut by the fact that PAS can rarely get permission to land anywhere other than airports. “Sometimes we can,” says Farag, “but it is very difficult.”

Two final options that sit at opposite ends of the cost-spectrum are the locally owned and operated Alkan Air and the Dubai-based Execujet.

Alkan Air, run out of a stylish office on a shady Zamalek street, operates two Beechcraft – a King Air 200 and a King Air 350. Propeller-driven, neither has anything like the prestige or the speed of a jet aircraft, or the space and comfort of the Saab. But charging a trifling $1,200 per hour, however, they give you something that the competition can’t: change for your $6,000 bill on that trip to Sharm. With a solid 2,000 nautical mile range, the 350 can also take you to Europe or the Gulf as easily as either of its more expensive rivals.

On the other hand, if saving a few thousand here or there is less important than getting there fast and getting there in style, give the Dubai offices of Bombardier Skyjet International a call. While they are substantially more expensive than anything in Cairo (prices start around $8,000 per flying hour) they also offer some very appreciable benefits that may justify the extra outlay.

To start with, they offer nicer planes. Dealing exclusively with craft put together by parent company Bombardier, they have a range of planes starting with the Learjet 60 and running up to the long-range Global Express, a $44 million piece of eye candy that can fly at Mach .85 as far as New York without refueling.

Under its Jet Membership program, Skyjet offers guaranteed 48-hour notice availability of a plane and does not charge for repositioning the aircraft to meet your needs. “The pricing is occupied hours – wheels up, wheels down [plus] six minutes before, six minutes after,” explains Skyjet sales director Nick Mossa. “Whether I bring the plane from London, or from Jeddah or from Kuwait, is none of the customer’s concern... it’s point A to point B. Occupied hours [only]: it’s a key benefit.”

The downside is that you have to sign up for a minimum of 25 hours in a year (though they do allow 25-percent wiggle room), and pay a substantial deposit. Yet Wassim Saheb, sales director of Execujet Middle East, puts a positive spin on even this aspect of the program. The customer, he argues, “can budget his traveling. If he knows he is going to be doing 50 hours or 25 hours – he knows that it is always going to cost him so much because of the occupied time: pricing’s fixed.”

Whether the advantages – guaranteed availability and no extra charges – outweigh the substantially higher costs depends on the customer, of course, but with a faster, sleeker fleet than anything available at the moment in Egypt, Skyjet looks to be the company to beat if you have the budget for high-end service.

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