Looking through Asia’s numbers
It is amazing how quickly business aviation in Asia is growing. Any presentation in Asia quickly gets to numbers – like the 1.4 million millionaires in China; the IMF’s forecast of 7.5% GDP growth for emerging Asia and so on.
In a presentation at our Asian conference in Hong Kong on Monday, Björn Näf, CEO of Metrojet, added some astonishing numbers of his own. If Asia takes delivery of the 1,00 new business jet aircraft that Bombardier forecasts will be delivered by 2021, Näf calculates that the region will need 3,400 new captains, a similar number of flight attendants and 5,100 mechanics. It is a big ask in a region where airlines are also very growing fast.
All of the 100 plus delegates and speakers at the conference are confident that the Asian market will grow but the mood at this year’s conference is more realistic than last year.
Alireza Ittiedieh, CEO of Freestream Aircraft Bermuda, cautioned that some Chinese buyers are now selling aircraft. “I never thought the market would get to this point so quickly,” he said. “Russia took 12 years.” In a contrasting presentation, Jason Liao, CEO of Asian Business Aviation Group was far more upbeat predicting that in 10 years China will be the largest business jet delivery market by value.
The infrastructure may not be ready but financiers are. Two years ago no international lenders would consider mainland-registered aircraft, today several leading international lenders said they are now comfortable doing this. Tomorrow leading local lawyers, Chinese leasing companies and others will give their views on this truly fascinating market.
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