2021 was a Banner Year for Business Aviation

Business Aviation in Europe has come through the global COVID-19 pandemic almost unscathed. Volker Thomalla reviews for GA Buyer Europe...

During the past two years, passengers who needed to travel for business or pleasure had no viable alternative to Business Aviation to cover longer distances. Airlines had massively thinned out their schedules and networks, leaving only business jets to meet travel needs. 

Although Business Aviation also experienced a noticeable decline in booked flights in the first half of 2020, bookings rose quickly thereafter — in the second half of 2021 activity even surpassed the levels of the record year, 2019. 

The entire industry value chain benefited from this high demand and the high number of flights operated. Maintenance operations had more work to do, as a high number of flight hours led to higher demand for maintenance activities; aircraft brokers were very busy as used aircraft sold, leading to the number of available used aircraft on the market decreasing. This naturally put pressure on prices. Finally, manufacturers saw increased orders for new aircraft. 

VistaJet’s Record Year 

Vista Global Holding, as one of the largest providers of business aviation services, had another record year in 2021. The group saw a 64 percent increase in flight hours flown worldwide last year compared to the previous year. Compared to the pre-crisis year of 2019, the increase in hours flown is still an impressive 57 percent. 

VistaJet customers can also purchase their flights with the executive charter company via an annual subscription. Last year, the number of hours flown by annual subscription customers increased by a staggering 90 percent to 22,000 hours compared to 2020. 

Thomas Flohr, Vista’s founder and chairman, said: “2021 has been an incredibly strong year for Vista and we have delivered all-time record-breaking figures as a result of the huge demand for our subscription, membership and on-demand offerings.

There is clearly a paradigm shift in the global client’s view of private aviation and Vista’s world-leading position has enabled clients across the globe to experience its benefits as a critical mobility solution. 

We are seeing contract sizes grow significantly across both VistaJet and XO and we are working around the clock to ensure we have necessary infrastructure and capabilities in place to ensure the complete flexibility and diversification of our services in the most sustainable way. 

“We have added over 30 aircraft during the year, strengthening Vista’s over 200-strong fleet offering. Having a fleet of Global 7500s now fully operational has been a game-changing moment since its launch in 2021, and we will build on its success by adding even more new Global 7500 aircraft to strengthen our global offering by the end of 2022.”

Fractional Ownership 

NetJets, the world's largest provider of fractional ownership aircraft, has also benefited from the Business Aviation boom and experienced a record year in 2021. At the end of 2021, the company operated around 30 percent more flights than at the comparable time before the outbreak of the Coronavirus crisis. In total, more than 600,000 passengers flew aboard the company’s aircraft last year. 

The combined fleet of NetJets in the US and NetJets Europe has grown to 760 aircraft – including those managed on behalf of customers. In 2021 alone, 55 new aircraft were added. In December, NetJets took delivery of its first Bombardier Global 7500, the company’s new ultra-long-range flagship. 

Despite the many new additions, however, the capacity on offer was not enough and NetJets was forced to keep aircraft in its fleet longer than planned. The company even stopped selling used aircraft and at times stopped accepting new customers! Currently, according to NetJets, the list of requests for new aircraft ownership includes over 2,000 entries worldwide. 

Orderbooks Swelled 

While commercial airliners manufacturers still had to accept order cancellations in 2021, the order books of business jet manufacturers filled up significantly. Some of the manufacturers had to struggle with problems in their supply chain in order to process all orders on time. 

According to the General Aviation Manufacturers Association (GAMA), manufacturers delivered 10.2 percent more business jets last year than in 2020. In absolute terms, there were 710 new business jets in the hands of their owners. 

Textron Aviation alone delivered 164 of these aircraft, Bombardier Aerospace came in at 120 deliveries, followed by Gulfstream Aerospace with 119, Embraer with 93, Pilatus Aircraft with 45, Honda Aircraft with 37, and Dassault Aviation with 30 business jets. In the personal jet segment, Cirrus Aircraft achieved 86 deliveries of its Cirrus SF50 Vision Jet.

Turboprops Did Well Too

However, not only the business jet segment, but also the turboprop segment performed well last year. According to GAMA, 527 turboprop aircraft were delivered by manufacturers to customers in 2021, which was 19 percent more than in 2020. 

Here, too, Textron Aviation came out on top with 54 Caravan family single-engine turboprops and 71 Beechcraft King Air twins delivered. Swiss manufacturer Pilatus Aircraft almost matched the previous year’s record with 88 PC-12 turboprop singles delivered, while Piper Aircraft closed 2021 with 46 Piper M500 and M600 turboprops delivered. 

French manufacturer Daher Aircraft, which produces the TBM turboprop singles and the utility single-engine Kodiak, was also quick to put the slump in deliveries in 2020 behind it. In 2021, the manufacturer delivered as many turboprop singles as it last did in the record-breaking year of 2019, delivering 17 Kodiak 100s to customers in addition to 51 TBM family aircraft. 

The main market for the TBM family is and remains in North America, and this did not change last year: of the 51 aircraft delivered, 39 found their home there. Europe caught up somewhat with a total of eight deliveries: two aircraft remained in France, two went to the UK, while one TBM each was delivered to Germany, the Netherlands, Cyprus, and Denmark.

The outlook for 2022 is positive, according to Didier Kayat, CEO of the Daher Group. He spoke at the presentation of the 2021 figures that 2022 could be the best year ever for Daher's aircraft manufacturing activities. 

At the moment the situation for Business Aviation looks good, although what impact the war in Ukraine will have is not yet foreseeable. But when it comes to getting from point A to point B over longer distances individually, safely, and quickly, there is no alternative to business aviation. In 2021, the industry was able to prove its resilience to the crisis by playing to its unique capabilities.