Settling a bet on air taxis and pilot entrepreneurs

[FN FAL]

Perhaps as an owner/operator you could earn a little as a pilot and earn a little off of your investment. In anycase if the plane is able to pay for itself then in ten years you could have a paid off asset worth over a million. That sounds better than a retierment plan at Delta to me.

SkyLine

Lot's of FBO owners fly their own jets on their own 135 certificates...I still can't figure out what you guys are getting at with this owner/operator babble. It's not like it's some new scheme dreamed up to take flying away from pilots.

The last FBO based 135 service I flew at, had an owner that flew Jet trips and piston trips and lots of them in his own aircraft. Nothing new to see here.

 

[Huggyu2]

BTW, it's spelled "Sacre Bleu!"

 

[Skyline]

Fn Fal

FN FAL,

Perhaps the new twist is that it would make success much easier if a system were set up where all the planes were branded alike and there was a central dispatch that handled all the scheduling, money transactions, advertising, training and maintenance, record keeping ect... A group approach could also make it easier for new "franchises" to get cheaper and easier financing. In the end hopefully it could mean that charter style transportation could become affordable to the middle class and provide a new industry to employ all these permanently laid off airline pilots. In addition it would be fun to swing open the hangar doors and see a brand new Citation Mustang with my name on the title.

SkyLine

 

[surveypilot]

Recent FAA Guidance

The FAA is not going to allow any "franchising" of 135 companies. Anyone that is intersted in the subject, should read the FAA's Recent discussion on this subject.

http://a257.g.akamaitech.net/7/257/2422/01jan20051800/edocket.access.gpo.gov/2005/05-21226.htm

The best that you could hope for is for each individual operator to have their own 135 certificate and have a loose association for marketing. However, this means that each operator is going to have the overhead of an individual Director of Ops and Chief Pilot and separate manuals, etc. This alone will prevent these independent operators from competing with companies like DayJet.

 

[JimNtexas]

Some say given the right package even senior guys might put in another 5-15 years if they ended up as owners. If the job was flying biz jets/air taxis from home city, flying 900 hrs and another 900 doing non-flying work forthe company, earning equity + salary and bens? Any opinions? No hurt feelings either way, trying to understand the environment better.

It's hard to see how the pilot ends up as an "owner". The owner is the guy for whom the pilot who works 900 hours in the office and 900 hours in the airplane works.

What percentage of company equity does the office worker/pilot earn every year? Can you make a case that this equity can be realized through a liquity event at some point, either by sale of the equity or residual income from the company?

Does the pilot/office worker/investor assume any liablities, legal or financial, for the company?

 

[Skyline]

Survey Pilot

SP,

There are ways around that. Lets say that the owner/operator owns the plane and leases it back to the parent company then is employed to fly it. In the end the results are the same. It is pure capitalism. If one is heavily invested in the operation then you will receive a higher level of service and commitment from the mentioned party. In any case it would be a better deal than the airlines are offering these days.

SkyLine