Saudi Arabian business aviation 'Back to 2019 levels by next year'


Saudi Arabian business aviation will be back to 2019 levels in 2021, Yosef Hafiz, Vice President Sales & Marketing, NASJET Private Aviation, told Corporate Jet Investor. Business flight activity in Saudi Arabia is approximately half of what it was during the second quarter of 2019. But Hafiz expects this to reach 75% by the fourth quarter and return to the same level next year.

Hafiz told CJI: “Saudi business aviation is picking up slowly but surely as many who used to not fly privately, but were highly qualified, are now considering charter or even purchasing their own jet. Saudi has been a domestic-only market for the past two months and we hope that international flights will open up in August so we can see a further rise in requests.”

Hafiz said business aviation in the region has changed substantially: “We have looked into cutting costs and expenses to the best of our abilities. We have also had clients who have asked us to look into innovative ways of reducing expenses further by approaching the aviation authorities and vendors to ask them to assist with the process of reducing expenses.”

Hafiz notes the Saudi Arabian market has a very high potential for NASJET. Citing new aviation rules and regulations that require all private jet owners to be under a management company that possesses a private or commercial aviation certificate.

Meanwhile, Hafiz recently provided insight for Corporate Jet Investor’s first digital conference, CJI Global 2020, contributing to the panel on Middle East Business Aviation 2020. Hafiz said: “It was the first time CJI has brought all regions together, where they used to be a conference in London, Miami, Singapore, and Dubai covering all contents, this was the first time we have seen everyone from every content brought together.” The Middle East panel discussion, part of more than 30 hours of video content dedicated to worldwide business aviation, is available to watch here.

 

  
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