Story ID: 376
Richer Programming Is Highlight of LABACE 2019
By: Richard Pedicini
Caption: Education sessions at LABACE offer something for industry veterans and future customers and new entrants.
Word Count: 783
LABACE 2019 features a full slate of speakers, examining the present and suggesting a strong future for Brazilian business aviation. The keynote speaker is well-known Brazilian economic journalist and former Central Bank director of international affairs Alexandre Schwartsman, who will address Brazil’s Political and Economic Scenario from the Second Half of 2019. As all local bizav predictions start with the economy and the government, the choice is apt, and the selection of a speaker well known outside the industry is a new step for LABACE.

As at last year’s event, the auditorium is integrated with the exhibits and static display area, making it easier to hear the speakers. In prior years, the auditorium was down a hill, a 10-minute trip. Tuesday morning’s opening and keynote will use the full stage, as will the first panel after lunch, discussing Technology and Disruption in Business Aviation and featuring Darcy Olmos-Mancilla, head of Airbus Urban Air Mobility for Latin America; André Stein, head of strategy for Embraer; and Paul Malicki, CEO of the Flapper flight-sharing app.

Airbus selected São Paulo for the global launch of its Voom helicopter-by-the-seat service; local giant Embraer will have a $4 billion war chest after its deal with Boeing goes through and plans to have its first electric test vehicle flying by early next year; and Malicki, who’s lived in eight countries, finds the city that hosts LABACE to be the best place to launch his service. UAMs are the shape of things to come and may come here first, according to prognosticators.

At 3:30 p.m., the auditorium will host three events at once, grouped by theme. Headphones will allow attendees to listen either to the original or the simultaneous translation. The political/Institutional stage will host the IV Labace Aeromedical Seminar. Until a few years ago the sector was restricted by law to police, but it is now open to private enterprise. Two Leonardo executives, Fábio Nannoni and Paulo de Jonge, will describe Italy’s helicopter emergency services. Aeromedical Implantation in Brazil will be addressed by Col. Ricardo Gambaroni, helicopter pilot and former head of the state police. Dr. Silvia Nobre Waiãpi, special secretary for indigenous health and the first Indian woman to become an army officer, will speak on Ministry of Health urgent care regulations. Finally, a panel discussion will include the speakers and also Colonel Paulo Luís Scachetti Jr., commandant of the state police air wing, Dr. Maria Cecília Damaceno of the state department of health, and ANAC official Marcus Vinicius Ramos.

Simultaneously, the sector theme discussion of Commercial Applications of Drones in Brazil will include professor Tiago Giglio Rodrigues of Anhembi Morumbi University, which has Brazil’s largest aviation sciences school, and this will be moderated by professor Edson Gaspar, the school’s dean. The other speaker, Kleber Coelho, CEO of Bembras Group, has sold 46 helicopters to public-safety and other state government bodies and in 2019, started selling drones to the same market.

That will be followed by Management and Finances of General Aviation Companies. Among the speakers is Rui Thomaz de Aquino, IBAS immediate past president and president of Two Flex aviation, operating Brazil’s largest Cessna Caravan fleet and starting to codeshare with airline Gol to extend commercial service to smaller cities. Other speakers are Liston Jr. of aircraft management and fractional operator Next/Syncjet; Sérgio Webber, v-p of operations and finance at fractional-share firm Avantto; and Ricardo Ambrosini, finance director of Icon Aviation, which grew in a few years from the spun-off Casas Bahia flight department to one of the country’s largest charter fleets. Moderating will be Francisco Lyra, ABAG ex-chairman, CEO of CFly Aviation, and founder of IBA (Brazilian Aviation Institute).

Finally, the theme for Tuesday at LABACE is Pleasures and Dilemmas of Aviation Lovers, starting with the presentation of ANAC’s new QR-code pilot’s license, and then featuring talks by Luiz Gustavo Junqueira Figueiredo and Daniel Torelli of the Bonanza Club, Paulo S. Noto and Fábio Freitas of the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association (AOPA), and aviation lawyer Roberta Fagundes Leal Andreoli.

The programming was curated by Raul Marinho, technical consultant to ABAG, along with ABAG chairman Flávio Pires and Rodrigo Cordeiro of event organizer MCI. “The topics were chosen in accordance with the projects we developed over the last year with ABAG’s technical experts,” Marinho told AIN. Do they represent the future? “In some case, such as disruptive technologies, yes. In others, such as fatigue and clandestine air transport they are the present. But, in general, they are the project that ABAG is developing.”