Business airline take-off looms after funds fly in

Published on Sunday 3 June 2007 00:52

FLY First, the business-class only airline headed by former Eurostar boss Hamish Taylor, is closing in on funding after two years of delays and its first flight is expected to take off within 12 months.

The company, backed by John Campbell, the former Scottish Mutual marketing director, and Peter Villa, the former managing director of Air UK, was one of the first to propose flying business class jets between London and New York when Taylor started fundraising in 2005.

Fly First missed its target of raising the required 23.5m by July 2005, and was subsequently overtaken by rivals such as Silverjet and Eos.

But the young airline appears to be back on track with plans to fly 48-seater luxury aircraft between London Luton and Newark, near New York. In a recent document, the firm said: "Fly First plans to complete the fundraising in 2007 and subsequently launch the proposed air service... in the third quarter of 2007."

Sources close to the airline suggested the launch could take a bit longer but that the service should be in place next year at the latest.

Despite the advent of competitors like Eos and Silverjet, headed by Laurence Hunt, Fly First said: "We believe that our offering will be innovative and we will be recognised for the quality of service we will offer our customers."

Meanwhile, Hunt told Scotland on Sunday that he expects Silverjet to have expanded into several new routes within a year.

Since floating the company on Aim 11 months ago, the stock has soared. In April it surprised the market with a 26m share placing on its investors. The company, which launched its first route in January, found itself short of cash after its flights proved more popular than it had anticipated. It said it planned to use the proceeds for expenditure not included in its original business plan, including the cost of acquiring Skylease and Flyjet in deals that enabled it to start flying five months earlier than planned.

Hunt said: "Our objective is to become profitable as quickly as possible. The way to do that is to consolidate around particular routes. This is why we will be growing the Newark route. We have a second Boeing 767 arriving in July and a third one coming in November so by the end of the year we shall have three flights a day going to New York.

"We will be making some announcements very soon but basically we have some very interesting plans for India, South Africa, China and cities like Los Angeles in the United States."