Air Taxi Service Plans SE Expansion In Two Years

They've been flying for weeks... but Wednesday morning, DayJet made it official. The upstart air taxi provider formally launched operations in a ceremony in Tallahassee, FL attended by, among others, Florida governor Charlie Crist.

Billed by the company as the world's first "Per-Seat, On-Demand" jet service, DayJet plans to utilize a large fleet of Eclipse 500 very-light jets to connect "DayPorts" in Tallahassee, Gainesville, Boca Raton, Lakeland, and Pensacola. The company also announced plans to expand operations within the next two years to dozens of additional DayPort locations across the Southeast, including Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina and Tennessee.

"I applaud DayJet for making Florida its headquarters and launch pad," Governor Crist said. "DayJet is investing in Florida's economy by creating new jobs, and I commend them for their work."

Many in the industry are keeping a close eye on DayJet's admittedly optimistic business model. The air taxi service offers a customized approach to business travel: passengers tell DayJet where and when they want to travel, and how much they are willing to pay.

If their time is at a premium, members can create a narrow travel window. When they have more flexibility, they can reduce their cost by setting a wider travel window. The more flexible members are with their travel time, the lower the airfare -- which, in most cases, should rival last-minute fares on commercial airlines, according to the company

To maintain a cost-effective management structure of such a fluid schedule, DayJet will rely on an all-digital, real-time operations system, which the company calls Advanced System Technology for Real-Time Operations, or ASTRO. The system -- which, DayJet points out, contains more lines of code than early releases of Microsoft Windows -- automates and manages every aspect of the company's operations, end to end. This includes customer reservations, billing and membership management; flight records and training; flight planning and scheduling; pilot electronic flight bag (EFB); DayPort field information; and maintenance control.

DayJet states over 1,500 business travelers have signed up for the company's services.

"We are embarking on a new era in regional transportation that, for the first time, brings the benefits of on-demand jet service to the average business traveler," said Ed Iacobucci, DayJet president and CEO (shown at right). "Starting today, business travelers in the Southeast can have all the power in the travel relationship. They can decide how much their time is worth and dictate a travel itinerary that increases their productivity and enhances their quality of life. It took years of hard work and innovations to make this new service a reality. It would not have been possible without close collaboration with our partners at Eclipse Aviation, Pratt & Whitney Canada, the Federal Aviation Administration, the State of Florida and our first DayPort communities."

Howard Gruverman, CEO of Edify USA and first customer to fly DayJet service said: "I was the first passenger on DayJet and the service exceeded my expectations. The plane was roomy and comfortable, the pilots had impressive experience and the whole service model worked exactly as promised. DayJet is a great tool for business people who want to make better use of their time, conducting more business while they improve their quality of life."

DayJet has raised more than $200 million to date in both private equity and debt to begin operations -- placing DayJet among the best capitalized pre-operational passenger air carriers in American aviation history, and the single largest carrier in the on-demand sector.

DayJet's success is not only important to the airline itself, but also to Eclipse Aviation. The on-demand airline is the Albuquerque, NM-based planemaker's largest single customer, by a significant margin.

"The Eclipse 500 very light jet's value proposition has inspired a new layer of affordable regional air transportation that will allow travelers to save time and be more productive," said Eclipse CEO Vern Raburn. "DayJet and Eclipse are demonstrating that the idea of a new class of aircraft that are compliant with the FAA's NextGen strategy will change the work-life balance of hundreds of thousands, and eventually millions of Americans."

FMI: www.dayjet.com, www.eclipseaviation.com