Empire Aviation Group (EAG), the Dubai-based general aviation company, will be at the Business Travel Show Middle East (BTSME) 2010 showcasing its executive jet operations and new promotional packages.
Executive director Paras Dhamecha said: “At the show, we will be focusing on our executive jet charter operations and Lifestyle@Empire, our dedicated, bespoke luxury travel division, combining our charter service with an online hotel booking service provided by our affiliate booking.com, which allows private jet charter clients, travelling on business or for leisure, to search and reserve online luxury hotels at preferential rates.
“We have partnered with some of the world’s leading luxury hotels and will promote jet-inclusive travel packages. Destinations to which we will be operating include the Maldives, Jaipur, India, Mauritius, Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt and Bali, Indonesia.”
The company’s new affiliation with booking.com allows private jet charter clients to search and reserve online luxury hotels at preferential rates. Those using Lifestyle@Empire can now search booking.com’s database of 78,000 hotels in 76 countries, including independent, luxury boutique properties and international five-star hotel chains, the service is available in 31 languages.
And Empire’s ‘one-stop-shop’ approach to private aviation means it can help a buyer or owner search, acquire, finance, manage, operate and charter a business jet.
In fact the company has also recently added three aircraft to its managed fleet of executive jets, bringing the total fleet size to 23 – one of the largest mixed fleets of executive jets in the region.
According to Dhamecha, charter operations have performed very well so far this year, with a 10 per cent increase in charter bookings. “The latter half of 2010 has definitely seen an up-swing in the executive charter market,” he said. “We have also seen a substantial increase in jet charters for business clients flying into emerging markets such as Iraq and Afghanistan.”
Looking ahead, Dhamecha is confident charter business will continue to see an increase through the end of the year and into 2011, well ahead of the same period last year.
Empire Aviation Group’s business model is based on aircraft asset management and this has performed very well, with significant year-on-year growth in company revenues and profit and growth in staff numbers as well as in the managed fleet of business jets.