European aircraft management and charter group Skyfirst is preparing to add to the five jets it already operates as it seeks a higher profile in the market. According to founder and CEO Olivier Perdriel, the privately owned company seeks relationships with aircraft owners who appreciate the value of highly personalized service through a sense of partnership with the operator.
Since the Covid pandemic, Perdriel has seen shifting private aviation priorities among high-net-worth individuals. “Clients are increasingly focused on the efficiency of operations,” he told AIN. “More of them are approaching us because they know we are reliable and reliability has been an issue [in the aircraft management sector].”
For those aircraft owners seeking to spread the cost burden, charter to third-party clients is an option, but it doesn’t always work to their advantage. “We recommend that they don’t allow too many cycles and hours [on their aircraft] and instead find people who want long-range flights with not too many people on board,” Perdriel explained.
The current fleet consists of a mix of long-range Dassault Falcon 7Xs and 8Xs, plus a Bombardier Global Express. Skyfirst says it is well prepared to diversify operations with other types that could include Embraer’s Praetor 600 and Phenom 300, the Gulfstream G650 and G550 models, Cessna’s Citation Latitude and XLS, and the Global 6500.
In 2024, Paris-based Skyfirst’s aircraft logged 2,774 hours across 921 flights with stops in 79 countries and 119 airports. The longest flight was 13 hours 14 minutes in a Dassault Falcon 8X, and the longest mission spanned 37 hours and 25 minutes—a round trip from the French capital to the Pacific island of Tahiti.
Overcoming Trip Obstacles
Skyfirst’s team prides itself on its ability to bypass seemingly insurmountable obstacles to important trips. For example, a customer wanting to fly direct to Sienna in Italy was dismayed to find the local airport had been closed for five years and then delighted when the operator managed to get it opened for their arrival.
When a country’s president flew to China on a Falcon, a landing gear component failure was discovered in Beijing. Skyfirst pulled strings with Dassault to get parts and technicians scrambled from Paris, and in less than 30 hours from the initial part failure, the jet was back in service.
Skyfirst’s team particularly likes working with owners who appreciate the difference their individuality and experience can make. “We need our people to feel part of situations like an AOG on a Saturday night at 11 p.m., and be ready to fight for the owner in these situations,” said Perdriel.
As a matter of policy, all of Skyfirst’s charter flights are booked through brokers. “They are a good filter because clients change their plans all the time, and this is a good role for brokers, who are more like concierges,” Perdriel said. “We work with selected brokers who work for very selective clients. They usually offer two or three different options for operators. We are normally the most expensive, but they know we are the problem-free option.”
While Skyfirst has a corporate office in Paris and trades on France’s refinement in areas such as cuisine, its EU air operator certificate was secured in Malta when the company launched in 2012. There, Perdriel found pragmatic professionalism in a regulator with a strong desire to serve the rarified needs of business aviation.
“We’re not there for tax reasons,” said Perdriel. He first talked with Maltese officials after discovering that French officials would take a long time to process a request to register the company’s first aircraft, which was a Bombardier Learjet 45.
By contrast, the process in Malta went very smoothly with minimal bureaucracy. Skyfirst has recruited pilots from Air Malta for its management team.
“It took just one meeting in Malta, and I could see their approach is to help operators to be successful in order to help them to be safe,” he concluded. There are now more than 900 business aircraft registered on the Mediterranean island.
Hostile Tax Environment in France
A more current challenge in Skyfirst’s native France is the government’s controversial and punitive tax on private charter flights, as part of a wider “airline ticket solidarity tax.” Tax rates for business aircraft charter flights range from €210 to €2,100 per passenger, depending on the length of the sector operated.
Perdriel and other industry leaders in the French branch of the European Business Aviation Association believe the government failed to conduct an impact study for measures that may pose an exponential threat to many operators, as well as to around one quarter of French airports. A study conducted in late 2024 by Deloitte concluded that the new levy would result in far lower tax revenues due to its negative impact on economic activity and employment.
In Perdriel’s view, the regulation of the private aviation industry generally has become excessively complex, with contradictory and duplicating requirements between countries over issues such as emissions trading. “I wish the leaders would be more pragmatic, because it is creating a very difficult environment for operators,” he said. “They need to be careful that they are not going against safety. If operators are losing money, the first thing they will lose is safety. If we don’t simplify rules, we might end up with things that are unsafe.”
Nonetheless, Perdriel’s strong attachment to the industry is clear. Back in 2010, at the age of just 26, he was recruited to turn around what was then a struggling air ambulance operation called Air Albatros. It was this experience that sparked his entrepreneurial zeal for private aviation, which is undiminished by the challenges the sector faces.