April 19, 2024
JetClass offers scheduled flights on private jets without membership fees.
By the seat, pay as you private jet operator JetClass is adding seven new routes in Europe with one-way fares starting as low as 390 Euros. The service, which doesn’t have a membership fee, sells individual seats on private jets with a fixed schedule. Passengers on these short flights benefit from using FBOs, private jet terminals, instead of having to transit commercial airport terminals, often cutting total travel time in half.
Starting in February, JetClass starts connecting Zurich with Milan, Luxembourg, Vienna and Munich. Additional new routes include Milan to Geneva, Basel, Zurich and Nice. The new flights are in addition to existing routes such as Zurich-Brussels, Brussels-London and Paris-Geneva. JetClass says it now operates 15 routes, and during its first six months of operations performed over 90 flights within Europe.
“We have launched JetClass as a response to the decreasing quality of business class on short-haul flights and no alternative for travelers. We see a great demand for our service and keep extending the schedule,” said Wagas Ali, CEO and co-founder of JetClass. “JetClass is not a luxury way of travel, we are creating a brand new tier of air travel bringing private jets to the masses and making them affordable to most of the travelers in Europe.”
Wagas added, “Our schedule is tailored to the needs of business travelers with different trip options…in the morning and fly back in the evening, or fly on Monday and a fly back on Thursday or Friday. We also focus on destinations that are not connected at all by commercial airlines, for example, Basel and Milan.”
JetClass was launched last year by Ali and business aviation veteran Vladislav Zenov to meet the need prompted by the increasing costs, decreasing quality and often low availability of business class flights, particularly short-haul flights around Europe. The service bridges the price gap between airline flights such as British Airways, Lufthansa, Air France and Swiss which often range $400 to $1,000 for the short hops and chartering an entire aircraft which can run from $15,000 to $30,000.
JetClass doesn’t own the aircraft, but is a broker and secures aircraft via charter operators. It says it is using artificial intelligence to determine its flight routes, analyzing the demand for each route against existing flight options in order to determine which flight itineraries will be offered as part of a dynamic schedule.
Surf Air and JetSmarter are also pioneering the use of private jets and turboprops in Europe with scheduled flights. However, JetSmarter shuttles are based on membership fees starting around $10,000 per year while Surf Air is using a hybrid model of membership and selling seats on individual flights. Surf Air has its own fleet of Embraer Phenom 300 and Pilatus PC-12 aircraft whereas like JetClass, JetSmarter is a broker sourcing aircraft from authorized operators.
