Tag: online booking

Should you charter a private jet online?

by Doug Gollan
private jet rental

After years of claims about Uber for private jets instant booking technology, it’s finally arriving. Should you book a private jet online?

After years of claims about Uber for private jets instant booking technology, it’s finally arriving. But should you use it?

Many of the broker websites and apps promising online bookings were nothing more than electronic request forms.

But that’s changing, and increasingly, you may find yourself able to rent a private jet or turboprop digitally from a broker or platform, and without much human oversight, or at least human oversight looking after your interests.

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JetSmarter is putting a push on full aircraft charter; Here are four reasons to be wary…and where JetSmarter says we were wrong!

by Doug Gollan 1 Comment
JetSmarter

After moving its shared flight program from free seats to paid and scheduled flights to a crowdsourcing model, JetSmarter apparently wants to focus on being a charter broker

12.4.2018 – Editor’s Note:  After publishing this article, Sergey Petrossov, CEO of JetSmarter, reached out to me to say he didn’t think the article provided a fair view of the company’s on-demand charter program. Normally, I would contact a company with questions before publishing, but after being told three times over the past two-and-a-half months JetSmarter wasn’t going to answer my questions, I didn’t bother. The article was also designed to highlight four places I saw shortcomings in their offerings. However, I have happily integrated Petrossov’s responses to my points in red and as always welcome any critiques people have on what I publish.”

Despite mounting lawsuits, JetSmarter is now more aggressively marketing full aircraft charters, apparently trying to compete with a host of online and offline brokers. While the sharing economy private jet provider has always sold full aircraft charters, it recently began displaying options for full aircraft charters when searching for flights, which are now apparently nearly all built on a crowdsourcing model as opposed to its previous model of having scheduled private jet flights to book by the seat.

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The personal touch will remain important in private jet charter

by Doug Gollan

At revolution.aero technology may have been center stage, but private jet charter brokers are likely to be a core part of the business for a while longer

 

While the focus of revolution.aero, a conference organized by Corporate Jet Investor here in San Francisco, was squarely on how technology will change the way we fly – including commuting to work aboard battery-powered airplanes and supersonic private jets within the next decade – charter customers will continue to want high touch service said, several executives. 

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Directional Aviation buys U.K.-based charter broker PrivateFly

by Doug Gollan
Kenn Ricci Flexjet Sentient Jet PrivateFly

The deal by the parent of Flexjet, Sentient Jet and Skyjet expands Directional Aviation’s global reach and doubles down on its online on-demand private jet charter business

 

OneSky, LLC, part of Directional Aviation and home to Skyjet, Sentient Jet and Flexjet, today announced it has acquired U.K.-based PrivateFly, a leading global digital booking service for private jet charter flights. According to a press release, PrivateFly is expected to combine with Skyjet, OneSky’s existing brokerage group and a pioneer in aviation technology for more than 20 years. The goal is to create one of the world’s largest online booking platforms for private jet charter, one with a robust digital platform and a physical geography and assets tailored for countries on four continents. 

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Stellar Labs Predicts On-Demand Private Jet Charter Market To Triple In Next “Six To Eight Years”

by Doug Gollan Leave a comment

Stellar is developing technology it says will enable real-time private jet charter bookings

 

Here’s a surprise:  Business aviation accounts for nearly 29% of all consumer spending on air travel in the United States and has nearly the same daily flight activity as commercial aviation, however, the process of booking private jet charters is still very much based on phone calls and emails.

 

Stellar Labs, Inc. which says it enables real-time bookings of on-demand private jet charters, today announced it has raised $26.3 million in Series A equity financing from Global Jet Capital, a provider of corporate aircraft financing solutions capitalized by The Carlyle Group, Blackstone’s GSO Capital Partners, and AE Industrial Partners, Columbia Equity Partners and Expa. In a press release, Stellar said combined with previous equity rounds and funding from Rockwell Collins, Stellar is investing over $50 million in its next-generation technology platform for business aviation. The company projects advances like it is making will triple the charter market in the next “six to eight years.” 

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PrivateFly Makes The Sunday Times Tech Track 100

by Doug Gollan
Jet Linx

The online charter broker and jet card seller was ranked on the Tech Track 100 for the second consecutive year

 

PrivateFly has made The Sunday Times Tech Track 100, for the second year running, it was announced yesterday. This is an annual league table, ranking the UK-founded private tech companies that are growing the fastest. 

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JET CARD INSIDER: What Do The Financial Statements Say About Air Partner?

by Doug Gollan

The private jet charter broker has been the subject of several recent reports from financial analysts

 

Air Partner has been around since 1961 so we know it has some staying power. Plus, the British based private aviation company is interesting to Private Jet Card Comparisons for a couple reasons. First of all, in recent years it has been putting a bigger emphasis in growing its jet card business, and secondly, as a publicly traded company, there is significantly more financial information available than the many other providers that are privately held or a subsidiary. We also like its 10-hour lead time for reservations is near the top of the league and the entry point is only $53,000. You can withdraw your funds at any time, but there is no escrow account, which means taking a closer look at financials makes sense. 

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