A new private jet company controlled by Irish financier Dómhnal Slattery has placed orders for 100 executive jets costing some $280 million (€222 million) from Brazilian group Embraer, the third-largest plane-maker after Boeing and Airbus.
Casting aside fears that the rise in oil prices has the potential to radically curtail air travel, JetBird aims to start a "low-cost" on-demand, point-to-point air taxi service from a hub in Zurich in April 2009 with five planes initially.
Clients will buy use of the planes by the hour, with a guarantee to fly them wherever they want to go.
JetBird is the launch customer for Embraer's new Phenom 100 aircraft, a four-seater "very light jet" with a range of 1,160 nautical miles.
These planes are in advanced planning at Embraer's base at São José dos Campos in the state of São Paulo, but they have not yet been flown. However, Embraer president and chief executive Maurício Novis Botelho says regulatory certification in the US and Europe is expected in 2008.
Mr Slattery's private investment vehicle Claret Capital has paid a $5 million deposit to Embraer. It will invest $20 million in early 2008 and an additional $20 million in 2010. The company aims to raise the remaining capital for the business on the long-term debt markets.
The company's aim is to prepare the business for a stock market flotation in 2013, Mr Slattery said. JetBird has firm orders to buy 50 of the Phenom 100 aircraft from 2009 - at a cost of $2.825 million each - and options to acquire another 50 in the five years after that. It has the right to convert the options to the larger Phenom 300 aircraft, which seats six and has a range of 1,800 nautical miles.
With Switzerland as its hub, the company aims to introduce services at "mini-hubs" in Germany, Italy, France and Britain as it receives its full supply of planes. If all goes to plan, clients will be able to fly into 800 airports and airstrips around Europe.
At the European Business Aviation Convention and Exhibition in Geneva yesterday, Mr Slattery said JetBird aimed to change the private jet market in the same way that Ryanair and its no-frills rivals had brought down the cost of airline travel.
The company will offer a premium service with a 15-minute check-in period at an affordable price, he said.
The company projects that 85 per cent of business will come from the corporate market with the remaining 15 per cent coming from leisure travellers who previously found that private jet use was beyond their budget.
With most private jet use on the rise, the company says that a sample cost per hour of $2,000 with three executives travelling would be cheaper than buying three business class fares on a standard airline.
The business jet market at present is dominated by NetJets Europe, part of Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway conglomerate, which this week disclosed plans to increase its fleet by a third to 119 before this year's end.
JetBird says it can achieve that by using a new generation of very light jets, such as the Phenoms, whose capital cost and fuel efficiency is greater than bigger planes already in use.
It sees opportunities to use its planes for multiple flights within Europe on any given day because the average private jet flight in the region takes only an hour and 15 minutes.
A former Guinness Peat Aviation executive, Mr Slattery made his name as a founder of International Aviation Management Group (IAMG), an aircraft leasing business.
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