EBACE 2025: Plugging into new opportunities

opinion

by Mike Stones

May 27, 2025

EBACE 2025 marked a "transition year" for the event, according to the organisers.

EBACE 2025 started for me with a plug – the electrical type. Or rather, the lack of one. After hurrying past DeeJay Deal who was blasting out Europop, and then walking through the entrance tunnel (of love?) into the main show arena, I discovered that none of my three adaptors (standard European, UK and US) would work. I needed a Swiss adaptor to plug into the Swiss electrical system.

Later, many panel sessions later, it struck me that this was not a bad metaphor for the way business aviation is striving to find one voice to maximise new opportunities, win new (influential) friends and clients and to answer its many critics – in Europe particularly but elsewhere too.

The spark of this idea formed in the first panel session I attended dedicated to associations representing business aviation. Kurt Edwards, director general for the International Business Aviation Council (IBAC) put the challenge into perspective.

“We represent the industry at the United Nations International Civil Aviation Organization. And one of our biggest challenges is explaining what business aviation is to a group of people who know what scheduled commercial transport is. But they don’t necessarily have that level of familiarity with the business aviation world,” he told the panel.

New generation of politicians

An even more important audience is to be found outside aviation, speakers agreed. Now is a good time to find a unified voice, as a new generation of politicians, policy makers and civil servants move into positions of power in Brussels, Strasbourg, Washington and London.

One powerful way of winning new friends for business aviation and influencing people is the Climbing.Fast initiative pioneered by the US National Business Aviation Association (NBAA) and other groups. The campaign, which has been extended to include an international audience, seeks to explain the benefits of business aviation – economic and social together with the sector’s environmental commitment – to two key audiences. Those are policy makers and this industry itself in helping business aviation to more effectively represent its case and respond to criticism.

Enthusiastic support for the scheme came from a new backer – the British Business General Aviation Association (BBGA). “We are really excited about joining Climbing.Fast,” said Lindsey Oliver, MD, BBGA. “In the UK, we are under more scrutiny than most when it comes to sustainability. I think it is another tool in our toolbox.”

Continuing the theme, in another session, Rollie Vincent founder, co-owner and president of Rolland Vincent Associates said: “We [business aviation] are teachers and we need to keep teaching.”

Acknowledging a rising tide of regulation and restrictions together with environmental criticism, Pascal Bachmann, senior vice president of sales for Europe, the Middle East and Africa for Jetcraft said: “Europe right now comes with its challenges.” Jetcraft sends more aircraft out of Europe than it sends into the region. But he remains fundamentally optimistic about business prospects. “If you have one region which is underperforming, there’s a very good likelihood you have another region which is overperforming. And that’s always been our strength.”

Buyers below the age of 45

Underpinning Bachmann’s optimism is Jetcraft’s forecast that over the next five years the pre-owned aircraft broker expects to sell more than 11,200 aircraft worldwide with a combined value of $73.9bn. Another encouraging trend was the rising number of buyers below the age of 45, which over the past 10 years has doubled. “Today in Europe and globally, we sell 29% of our aircraft to people below the age of 45. And that percentage is higher in Africa and in the Middle East.”

A plea for the industry to be more vocal about its achievements came from Holger Krahmer, secretary general of the European Business Aviation Association. “We have in Brussels new compositions of new institutions, we have a new European Commission, we have a new European Parliament,” he told the State of the Industry panel. “With the highest number of new elected politicians in Brussels, there’s an opportunity to reach out to them and to hope for open doors.”

Turbulent times in the world economy – influenced in part by President Trump’s on/off tariff plans – make effective communication even more important. Edwards, from IBAC, had advice about this in another session: “My wish for business aviation is not to be discrete, not to be confidential [about business aviation’s many achievements]. My hope is that during the next five years the industry coalesces around Climbing.Fast and helps politicians to be good leaders.”

‘A transition year’

The EBACE 2025 show, as widely billed, was a different experience from previous events in the city by the lake. The first since the end of EBAA’s 20-year partnership with NBAA to stage the annual event, there was no static exhibition at this year’s event. There were fewer airframes in the main arena and a much greater emphasis on discussion panels. But then, this was always intended to be “a transition year”, according to the association.

EBAA is working on a range of ideas to develop next year’s event – including a different venue elsewhere in Europe. “Our goal is to reimagine EBACE with and for our stakeholders,” said Krahmer. “While changes take time, one thing remains clear to us: the industry needs EBACE and it remains the right place to meet the right people in business aviation.”

Despite more red tape and environmental criticism, he remains optimistic about the prospects for business aviation in Europe and the UK because both shared “common projects, common opportunities, common ground for new agreements and deals”.

Back at this year’s event, my electrical plug problems were easily solved with the purchase of a Swiss electrical adaptor from the organisers’ office for a modest CHF 11.50 ($13.91).

Meanwhile, plugging into one powerful voice to best represent business aviation on both sides of the Atlantic and elsewhere will prove more complicated.