I'm sorry but please get your facts straight before posting on a public forum. What you've been told by your friend isn't all correct. Everyone is still waiting on the sim to get certified here in the US. The only other sim is in the UK at the CAE Simuflite center there and received EASA certification recently. That being said, CAE DFW is confident that they'll soon FINALLY receive certification here in the States. If that happens as planned this month (which we've heard pretty much every month for most of 2009) the sim should be ready for clients by October sometime.
The Phenom 100 has been certified for just under a year. Currently there are 25 or 26 Phenom 100's that are N-number registered in the US and are currently operational. These fleet facts are from the FAA database and are very easy to look up publicly by type (EMB-500). The Phenom 300 hasn't received certifications yet from the FAA nor ANAC in Brazil but, they're very close and the two types should be the same type rating with Class Bravo differences (meaning a day of ground school). There are also two Embraer Service Centers, one in FLL and the other at IWA in Phoenix. Along with the two main Embraer facilities, a number of authorized service centers are also in operation.
JetSuite has had one Phenom under management (and it's NOT experimental) since March and they'll tell you that. That info was provided even at the interviews that were held in May. Training is being done through ECTS, a joint venture between CAE and Embraer that's similar to Bombardier/CAE. ECTS stands for Embraer/CAE Training Services. Right now with the sim unavailable everyone trains in the actual aircraft. These aircraft are from Brazil and they're the only ones being used by ECTS. There are four aircraft, sometimes five. Usually they'll try to keep two operational in Sao Jose, and two at Ft. Worth Alliance. They rotate them out on a regular basis for mx and other inspections that need to be done in Brazil. All the airplanes are the prototypes except for the fifth, SN-5, and they're all Brazilian registered. SN-5 is a production aircraft that Embraer owns and is only used for training if the others are down for mx and it's mainly used by Embraer as a demonstrator aircraft.
That's why there's been such a delay in training because Embraer and CAE have extreamly limited resources. Other owner/operators are being typed in their own aircraft after they've had someone take delivery for them. Each aircraft you purchase comes with a type rating or two, whatever is in the pre-purchase contracts. Owner/operators are and have been seeking outside instruction for the time being to bypass these delays and are using either the three FAA POI's currently approved to give the type rides or the recently added DPE here in SoCal that's been approved. JetSuite can't use this outside training nor can they ellicit the use of the DPE because that's not in our contracts nor has it been approved for 135 training and checking. Right now we're entitled to the free type ratings per our purchase agreements and can only use ECTS.
These delays haven't just effected us. They're giving evey commercial operator a headache along with owner/operators, and there's just not much anybody can do right now but wait for the FAA to approve the sim here in the US. All I can say right now about staffing is we're staffed and, training, albiet slow, is happening. I really won't say more than what I've already said but I hope that this update has been helpful to those interested. When we do interview again, it will be advertised on the JetSuite website. Sorry I don't have any info on any hiring timelines and I'm sure that would be confidential information until it became public.
