Page 49 - World Airnews Magazine June 2020 Edition

NEWS DIGITAL

WILL PRIVATE JETS SOAR

BECAUSE OF COVID-19?

ration purchases
a charter, they
In the coming weeks and obviously have
control over who is
months, Dan Early has on the flight. As Best
predicted there will be “a fairly Jets executive VP
significant uptick in demand” Larry Gregg notes,
for charter flights like those executives “limit
operated by his firm, St. Paul- [their] exposure to
based Best Jets International. the general public.” to spike around March 13, from Florida. By March 25,
Before the corona virus Best Jets, based at the St. just as governors were urging when Gov. Tim Walz announced
began aggressively spreading Paul Downtown Airport, is residents to stay home. He his stay-at-home order, charter
across the United States, Early, solely owned by Best Buy started to hear from customers business had dipped, Early said.
director of marketing and founder Richard Schulze. who previously had not flown However, the company,
business development, was The company built two private, but were eager to which employs about 30 pilots,
selling privacy, security, and hangars for (US) $6 million and return to Minnesota. “One was expects demand to rise during
convenience for those willing to moved into the 38,000-square- a group of businesspeople that the spring and summer.
pay for a charter flight. foot facility in 2018. were in a [undisclosed] location As parts of the economy
At a time when people are The 10 corporate jets and they opted not to fly back reopen, Early anticipates
worried about being infected in its charter fleet include commercially,” Early said. “So travellers will place a premium
with the corona virus, flying Bombardier Challengers, we sent an airplane out to get on the attributes unique to a
private avoids a TSA security Cessna Citations, and Dassault them.” charter flight. Q
line, as well as a large airport Falcons and seat from eight to Others cut short business or Article courtesy: http://tcb-
terminal. 19 passengers. vacation trips and Best Jets flew mag.com/news/articles/2020/
Also, if a family or corpo- Demand, Early said, started a number of executives home may/

NEWS DIGITAL VIRGIN AUSTRALIA TARGETS

END-JUNE SALE

confident that our target of achieving a sale by the end of June is
achievable.”
Twenty parties are interested in recapitalising Virgin Australia, He said, “Management had already put in place a transformation
administrator Deloitte said after the first creditors meeting held plan to enhance profitability. Voluntary administration provides
virtually on 30 April, as the airline aims to receive binding offers in a process where that can be accelerated in a way that it couldn’t
before.”
June. Following the update, S&P downgraded Virgin Australia’s
“A large number of parties have expressed an interest, eight have unsecured debt from “C” to “D”, citing the moratorium placed on
signed non-disclosure agreements and negotiations are continuing all the airline’s creditor payments. It expects no such payment to
with a further 12,” the carrier said in a recent statement. be made between the first creditor meeting and the second one
It added that Deloitte has “moved quickly in its plan to restruc- targeted for 22 August.
ture and refinance the business and seek interested parties for a “During the administration process, the company will explore
sale” since its appointment on 20 April. options to recapitalise the business, or otherwise, realise value
Investment banks Morgan Stanley and Houlihan Lokey have been from the company’s asset base to maximise returns to creditors,”
appointed to run the sale process. S&P stated.
Deloitte intends to seek an extension of the convening period “We expect that unsecured lenders will be forced to accept less
of three months, “based on the scale and scope of their work to value for amounts owing under the terms of the existing unsecured
position the business for a successful sale”. debt facilities as part of the anticipated debt restructuring and
The carrier said this means the second creditors’ meeting will be re-capitalisation process.”
held around 22 August, adding that it is “not unusual in a complex In its statement, Virgin Australia said it remained in operation
voluntary administration such as this”. while in voluntary administration, with 64 return domestic services
Deloitte lead administrator Vaughan Strawbridge said in the each week, contracted domestic charter flights and federal
same statement: “We are now moving quickly to finalise a business government-supported international flights to Hong Kong and Los
plan to help guide interested parties and, in terms of next steps, Angeles. Q
mid-May is currently the timeframe for the receipt of indicative Article courtesy: https://www.flightglobal.com/virgin-austra-
offers. Binding offers will then be required in June. We remain lia-targets-end-june-sale-administrator/138199.article

World Airnews | June Extra 2020
— 2 —