Private jet-setters take off

BANGALORE: Forget Maybachs and Rolls Royces. It’s time to buy those gleaming flying machines.

Until a couple of years ago, India was home to just two dozen private planes. There are 130 private planes now. Aviation industry sources say that in the next 10 years, India would be home to one of the world’s largest number of private jet owners.

Experts estimate the demand for private jets to grow at almost 50 per cent on a year-to-year basis. Last year, the government granted almost 100 permits to import private jets and helicopters.

At the Aero India show in Bangalore, which will conclude today, private business jet manufacturers outnumbered military aircraft manufacturers.

Private jets cost anywhere between a few crores and Rs300 crores and house private showers, king-size beds, Internet and satellite phone connections, and even a dedicated service crew.

Leonard Knaapen, a senior executive with Bombardier, says the rising number of High Net Worth Individuals (HNWIs) in India makes it an attractive market. “India has the third largest number of millionaires in the world after the US and Germany. This will translate into big business for us,” he told DNA.

Giving a peek into the shape of things to come, he said, “Only two out of the Fortune 100 companies do not own corporate jets. Wal-Mart owns 13 Learjets and two Globals. These are used by managers to fly to units across the US every morning and return by evening.”

With India Inc embarking on a global growth path, private jets will not just be symbolic of power and pelf, but will also crunch time. A Bombardier study says that for every 400 hours a businessman flies his jet, he saves almost a month’s time.

Bombardier’s Global Express is the favourite flying machine of Lakshmi Mittal. “Mittal’s Global Express may have cost him over Rs200 crores, but his ability to skip the crowded airports may have already saved him several times that money,” argues a senior executive of one of the business jet makers.

Mukesh Ambani, who is building up a private air force of sorts, not only frequently flies his older version of Global Express but has even lent it to Congress president Sonia Gandhi. His brother Anil Ambani too owns a Global Express, besides a Falcon 2000, and is now waiting for his new Falcon 7X.

G Mallikarjuna Rao, the GMR chief whose company has won the contract for privatisation of the Delhi airport, may not be such a familiar face, but his recently acquired Falcon 2000 can definitely be spotted in Delhi, Mumbai and Hyderabad. “Rao spends several hours of waking time in his plane,” says an executive familiar with Rao’s busy flying schedules.

While the Indian market has its challenges, the opportunities are immense. “A lot has changed in the last two years. For the first time we have appointed a sales director in India,” says Bombardier regional vice-president (Asia Pacific) David M Dixon.

A senior official with another private plane manufacturer says over 150 private planes would be sold this year. At the top-end of the spectrum are the Airbus Corporate Jet and Boeing Business Jet, both worth around Rs250 crores each. Vijay Mallya is the latest owner of an Airbus Corporate Jet (A-319) in India. Mukesh Ambani is awaiting his Airbus Corporate Jet.

Joining him in his wait is the Maran family of Sun TV, which has placed an order for two business jets. Others who are waiting for their flying offices are the owners of Bharat Forge, Videocon and DLF.

Many businessmen from Tier II and III towns are also among those enthusiastically looking at these planes. Bellary, the mining town in Karnataka, already boasts of a few helicopter owners.

An executive of an international plane manufacturer says Tirupati, where the textile business has taken off ever since the global textile quota ended, Bangalore and Hyderabad are hot markets.

The Exclusive Club

Vijay Mallya: Airbus Corporate Jet
C Sivasankaran: Boeing Business Jet
Lakshmi Mital: Bombardier Global Express, Gulfstream GV
Mukesh Ambani: Bombardier Global Express, Falcon 900EX, Airbus Corporate Jet
Anil Ambani: Falcon 2000, Bombardier Global Express, Falcon 7X
KP Singh (DLF): Gulfstream GIV
HS Narula, Pramod Mittal: Embraer Legacy
Ratan Tata: Falcon 2000
Gautam Singhania: Challenger 604
Tulsi Tanti, Narendra Kumar Baldota: Citation XL