SATCOM DIRECT

MySky, the only AI-powered spend management platform designed for the private aviation industry, and Satcom Direct (SD), the business aviation solutions provider, announced a strategic alliance enabling seamless access to real-time data for private aviation. Subscribers to MySky and SD will greatly benefit from an all-encompassing approach to aircraft management that combines operational and financial information into a single source of data, the SD Pro® platform.

Designed to bring transparency to the industry for the first time, MySky provides unrivaled access to financial data and proprietary IT tools that help owners and operators reduce costs, refine spending and improve the overall aircraft ownership experience. SD Pro, the digital management dashboard, provides relevant and timely information about pre- to- post flight aircraft performance to aircraft operators around the world. An open architecture platform, SD Pro adds value to the user experience through the integration of third-party suppliers. As a result of the integration with MySky, SD will add a financial component to its SD Pro platform.

The agreement between MySky and SD will allow for a full 360-degree approach to business aviation management, promoting a fiduciary duty among industry stakeholders. Through the SD Pro platform, aircraft operators will have direct access to financial and operational information from both MySky and SD. The integrated data can increase longevity of ownership and improve the overall ownership experience. The aggregated information enables better informed, proactive decisions in real-time, heightening control and efficiency. Rote tasks can be automated to increase productivity and reallocate valuable human resources.

“At MySky, our goal is to bring increased transparency and accountability to the private aviation industry by ensuring stakeholders have the necessary tools to better understand and manage the costs of their assets,” said Kirill Kim, co-founder and CEO of MySky. “By combining our industry-leading financial data with SD’s detailed operational information, I’m confident that this alliance will help stakeholders better navigate the long-time obstacles associated with private aviation management.”

“SD is dedicated to delivering advanced technological capabilities to our customers. With the integration of MySky into the SD Pro platform, we are adding a significant resource to the operational mix by providing a business management tool that complements our operations-focused products. We are excited to work closely with the MySky team to foster industry growth and long-term sustainability for our clients,” said Chris Moore, SD president of business aviation.

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BOEING

Boeing and Enter Air announced the Polish airline is expanding its commitment to the 737 family with a new order for two 737-8 airplanes plus options for two more jets.

An all-Boeing operator and Poland’s biggest charter carrier, Enter Air began operations in 2010 with a single 737 airplane. Today, the airline’s fleet includes 22 Next-Generation 737s and two 737 MAX airplanes. When the new purchase agreement is fully exercised, Enter Air’s 737 MAX fleet will rise to 10 aircraft.

“Despite the current crisis, it is important to think about the future. To that end, we have agreed to order additional 737-8 aircraft. Following the rigorous checks that the 737 MAX is undergoing, I am convinced it will be the best aircraft in the world for many years to come,” said Grzegorz Polaniecki, general director and board member, Enter Air.

Enter Air and Boeing also finalized a settlement to address the commercial impacts stemming from the grounding of the 737 MAX fleet. While the details of the agreement are confidential, the compensation will be provided in a number of forms and staggered over a period of time.

“In the settlement with Boeing, we agreed to revise the delivery schedule for the previously-ordered airplanes in response to current market conditions. The specific terms of the settlement are strictly confidential, but we are pleased with the way Boeing has treated us as its customer,” added Polaniecki.

“We are humbled by Enter Air’s commitment to the Boeing 737 family. Their order for additional 737-8s underscores their confidence in the airplane and the men and women of Boeing,” said Ihssane Mounir, senior vice president of Commercial Sales and Marketing, The Boeing Company. “We look forward to building on our decade-long partnership with Enter Air and working with the airline to safely return their full 737 fleet to commercial service.”

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GOGO (Biz Jet Info)

Gogo Business Aviation has once again set a new standard for inflight connectivity with its AVANCE L5 system now installed and flying on 1,000 business jets.

It’s a milestone Gogo reached in less than three years following the first installation, making it the most successful adoption of any high-speed broadband inflight connectivity system in business aviation history. In addition to the 1,000 L5 installations, Gogo is nearing 450 installations for the AVANCE L3 system. Combined, the nearly 1,500 AVANCE system installations highlights Gogo’s leadership in inflight connectivity in business aviation.

“Our team hit it out of the park with both the AVANCE L5 and L3 systems,” said Sergio Aguirre, president of Gogo Business Aviation. “And what’s so exciting to me is that we still have so much opportunity ahead of us.”

The Gogo AVANCE L5 delivers a 4G experience to business aircraft of all types and sizes, from light jets to the largest global business jets, and provides the easiest and most economical upgrade path to Gogo 5G when it launches. From the time AVANCE L5 launched in the fourth quarter of 2017, more than 325,000 flights have taken off with the system onboard, flying more than 420,000 hours and 211 million miles, and users consuming 150 million megabytes of data.

“We couldn’t have achieved this milestone without the great partnerships we’ve built over more than 25 years with the market-leading business jet manufacturers, our dealers, and charter and fractional operators,” Aguirre said. “Even during the COVID-19 pandemic that has had such a dramatic impact on all of aviation, we continued to see a healthy demand from the market for our AVANCE systems.”

Gogo and its OEM partners and dealers have also experienced substantial adoption of both AVANCE L5 and L3 on a retrofit basis with more than 200 supplemental type certificate (STC) approvals from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). Both L3 and L5 systems are linefit factory options on the majority of business jets of all types and sizes from the world’s largest business aircraft manufacturers.

The Gogo AVANCE L5 system connects to the Gogo Biz 4G network delivering faster speeds and enhanced network capacity enabling activities such as live streaming video and audio, video conferencing, on-demand movies, faster web browsing, personal smartphone use, real-time data for cockpit apps, and remote diagnostics and support while in flight.
Early in 2018, Gogo launched AVANCE L3, a system that delivers the benefits of the Gogo AVANCE platform to passengers and flight departments in a lightweight, smaller form factor compared to L5. AVANCE L3 allows users to customize their inflight experience based on their unique needs and can be installed on business aircraft of all types and sizes, but is an ideal solution for smaller aircraft including turboprops and light jets.

In total, at the end of the second quarter 2020, Gogo Business Aviation reported 5,399 aircraft flying with its air-to-ground (ATG) systems onboard and also 4,704 aircraft flying with satellite systems onboard.

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OTHER NEWS

• We are real Apple fans!
  And because we are Apple fans, we also are fans of the gentleman who said; “Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”
  Who said it? Steve Jobs, Apple’s founder gave those words during a Commencement Address at Stanford on June 12, 2005. Today his company is worth $2 Trillion dollars, and unfortunately, he is no longer alive. However, some things he said were far, far ahead of other philosophical suggestions and submittals! We are linking the article from Stanford which is his address at the commencement, and, as he noted – “Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.”
  Text of Steve Jobs’ Commencement address (2005)
  (Editor’s Note: While there is no question that Steve Jobs was the miracle behind Apple, an engineer named Steve Wozniak was the ‘brains’ behind the Mac, and no Apple story would be complete without him. Wozniak is a genius and is still alive today, involved with a lot of technology and good will. When he started, Mac was not necessarily on his mind: “My dream was actually just to have a computer some day. If I’d imagined that it meant starting a company to sell them, I probably would have avoided the whole thing.” While looking for a final quote from Wozniak that readers would identify with, we found this and it sums up his world quite well: “In the end, I hope there’s a little note somewhere that says I designed a good computer.” Yes Mr. Wozniak, you really, really did!)
• Industry sources indicate that American Airlines is preparing to cut 19,000 jobs by October 1, 2020 and Delta Air Lines is also planning to furlough nearly 2,000 pilots in October.
• Just so you know, there will be a potential asteroid impact on earth Nov. 2 this year. Chances asteroid 2018VPI will hit the earth is 1 in 240 probability, because the miss range will be 4,994.76 km away. And, since it is only 6.5 ft. wide, no worries!
• So, a former engineer asked us: “So with all this anti-virus technology being developed and used, I have a question: Are we setting ourselves up for creating a ‘super-virus’ by using so much anti-viral spray or UV light treatments? I mean, we have all heard before how a treatment or vaccine kills MOST of the germs/virus, but some still survives and over time, the surviving germs/virus become immune to ‘standard’ treatments and thus become ‘super-bugs.’ So all this use of sprays on aircraft or rental cars or hotel rooms; and other places etc. Are we setting ourselves up for an even bigger problem in the future? Just wondering . . .  and if anyone knows, can you verify for me whether or not the UV wavelength that kills the virus does or doesn’t deteriorate the fabrics and materials on cars, planes, and train . . .  thus increasing maintenance and replacement costs?” (We will forward your response – Editor)