Bombardier Business Aircraft hopes to have a new Asia-Pacific regional service centre for its products set up in the first quarter of 1999, says the company's vice-president and general manager, customer support.
David Orcutt flew into Asian Aerospace '98 to take a closer look at a shortlist of potential partners.
Bombardier is considering two options - authorising an established service centre to handle the Canadian manufacturer's aircraft or helping a new player set up shop.
Whether his company will consider helping to fund a new operation depends on the nature of the partnership finally settled upon, but he notes that "-the value we bring is a good amount of technology transfer".
There are simply not enough Bombardier Business Aircraft machines in Asia to warrant the cost of the Montreal-based company setting up a service centre itself: "The servicing business is one we know and do well and if it weren't for the economics, we would do it ourselves," says Orcutt.
With around a dozen Bombardier machines based in Malaysia, that nation is the likely site, with Kuala Lumpur the preferred location.
Bombardier has been running the rule over potential partners for the past year. Orcutt describes his visit as a fact-finding tour where he will be "-fine-tuning the economics".
If Bombardier decides to bring in somebody who does not already have a servicing base, the rough cost just of a hangar sufficiently large to handle the Global Express ultra-long-range business jet would be around $5-7 million.
Source: Flight Daily News
