Luxury, calm and voluptuousness. The flight of the Bombardier Global 7500 from Farnborough airfield outside London this summer was accompanied only by a slight creak. VistaJet, the world’s number one in business aviation based in Malta, is an exception in a gloomy economy with its flights.
The improvement seen during the Covid years, in 2021 and 2022, has given way to turbulent weather conditions since the resumption of scheduled airline operations. Since 2023, the number of flights by private jets has steadily decreased. And 2024 confirms this trend. Calculated in twelve months, from April 2023 to April 2024, according to figures from the European Business Aviation Association, in Europe, the drop in the number of flights was 4.9%.
A recall that does not affect VistaJet. “While the market contracted 4% this year, activity grew 12%”at the same time, he welcomes Nick van der Meer, CEO of the airline. The acceleration continues. In the first half of the year, it saw a 14% increase in the number of flight hours compared to 2023, while the global market decreased by 2%.
Up to 25,000 euros per flight hour
A countercyclical success that is due to its economic model. “There are three different types of commercial companies”the general director specifies: those who practice “timeshare rental in which customers purchase a share of an aircraft; owners purchasing their own device and eventually subscription like VistaJet ». These are twenty-five flight hours per year, each billed at 12,000 euros on average. The hour of flight aboard a Bombardier Global 7500, the flagship, amounts to 25,000 euros, or more than 300,000 euros for a Paris-New York round trip. In 2023, the company logged 200,000 flight hours, accumulated 33,400 subscription hours and has around 1,300 subscriber customers.
At the same time, deliveries of business aircraft have resumed. Driven by a 2.5% annual growth rate, they even surpassed 4,000 devices in 2023. The first time in ten years. A boom from which the main manufacturers besieged by orders benefit.
In the first quarter, Dassault’s order book increased by 41%, Bombardier and Gulfstream’s by 44% and 22% respectively. And this despite the high cost of the devices. Thus, a Bombardier Global 7500, billed at 75 million euros each, not including cabin equipment, has a price equivalent to that of a medium-haul Airbus A320. However, when the first accepts a dozen passengers on board, the Airbus can carry between 150 and 180.
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