PROFILE • PAT GALLAGHER

NetJets capitalises on the ‘f light to quality’

NetJets Aviation pioneered fractional aviation and now claims 36% of the market. So, where does further growth lay for the world’s largest operator of business jets? We ask president Patrick Gallagher. Words: Mike Stones

Pat Gallagher, president, NetJets Aviation.

PROFILE

PAT GALLAGHER

NetJets capitalises on

the ‘f light to quality’

Pat Gallagher, president, NetJets Aviation.

NETJETS AVIATION president Patrick Gallagher knows every detail counts. It is a big reason why the company has so many loyal clients. One thing he personally makes a point of doing is sending long-standing owners (Gallagher refers to them as such) cards to mark significant anniversaries with the company. There’s every indication he can expect to sign many more in future.

“Once a quarter, I sit down to sign cards to owners,” Gallagher tells CJI. “We send cards and gifts to owners when they reach big milestone anniversaries. It’s one of my favourite things to do.”

To explain why Gallagher can expect to spend more time with pen in hand, a good place to start is the scale of the operation that he has served as an executive leader for nearly 15 years. To say that NetJets is big is like saying that Tiger Woods plays a good game of golf.

But it started small. The forerunner of the company – Executive Jet Aviation – began flying in 1964 with a modest fleet of 10 Learjet 23s. Now, over 60 years later, NetJets has an active fleet of more than 1,000 aircraft across its three operating companies – more than triple the size of its nearest rival Flexjet with a fleet of 302 jets and flyExclusive with 109 assets. That’s according to data from consultancy WINGX.

Last year the company flew 575,848 hours and claimed 36% of the market. That compares with nearest rivals Flexjet at 14% and flyExclusive at 4%. In the eight months to July this year, NetsJets completed 242,418 flights and NetJets Europe accounted for 38,363. Flexjet logging 97,481 and flyExclusive achieving 24,888 flights.

NetJets’ numbers continue to rise. Last year the business took delivery of 75 new jets – bringing the total value of business jets received last year to about $1.8bn. This year the company plans to take delivery of nearly 100 more new jets. The fleet spans about 11 different models including light cabin jets (such as the Phenom 300E), midsize (Citation Latitude), super-midsize cabin (Citation Longitude) and long-range (Global 7500). The Embraer Praetor 500 is the newest edition to the fleet to be joined by the Cessna Citation Ascend towards the end of the year. Next year the company is looking forward to the delivery of its first Bombardier Global 8000s.

My first question to the man at the helm of this vast business aviation empire is: what’s driving growth? “We’ve been very fortunate to have a market that has been favourable for our industry,” he tells us. “NetJets in particular, has seen considerable growth in our shared ownership programme. Pioneered decades ago, fractional continues to resonate with the market.”

It’s a simple idea. Fractional aircraft ownership enables individuals and companies to buy a share of a private jet rather than the entire aircraft. It offers the privacy and convenience of private jet travel without the full financial burden and responsibility and, increasingly, the public visibility of owning a big shiny business jet. Typically, owners pay for their share in advance and receive either a set number of flight hours or a percentage of the aircraft's yearly flight time. Other costs include management fees and hourly operating costs.

The business model certainly impressed Warren Buffett, whose holding company Berkshire Hathaway acquired NetJets in 1998 for about $725m. After a somewhat chequered financial performance over the years, NetJets and training business FlightSafety International helped Berkshire Hathaway’s aviation services lift revenues of its services division by 9.1% last year compared with 2023.

“One of the fastest growing segments of our business is people converting from outright ownership into fractional. It feels like almost a week doesn't go by that I don't see somebody who's selling an airplane and joining NetJets,” says Gallagher. “That supports the case for our model. In the first half of this year, we saw flight activity up 12% and in Q3 we're seeing even more year-over-year demand than that.”

For Gallagher, NetJets’ growth is a magic circle that shows no sign of unravelling. “We are taking delivery of more aircraft, which means you have owners who are buying those airplanes and paying management fees against them and flying them more each year,” he explains, “This is the key for continued growth and we enjoy high retention rates as well – so there’re no signs of business slowing.”

All this year's new aircraft are fully committed to share owners and nearly a third of next year's deliveries are committed too.

While a range of factors contribute to fractional’s rising popularity – including tax advantages and anonymity – neither are the main drivers, according to NetJets. “For our business, it ultimately comes down to two key factors – safety and service,” says Gallagher. “Our owners choose NetJets for those two things above all else. People choose to fly privately for many of the same reasons they always did – they want to avoid the hassles of commercial airlines and they want to avoid the hassles of owning their own jet.”

NetJets has a fleet of more than 1,000 aircraft across its three operating companies.

NetJets’ owners divide between about 60% who fly for leisure and 40% who fly for both leisure and business – although separating the two can be difficult. The company is proud to claim among its owners more than 40% of Fortune 500 firms (or one of the 500 largest companies in the US ranked by total annual revenue).

Clients are also becoming younger, as the Baby Boomer generation transfer assets to their children. Over the next 20 years, up to $90trn in assets will be transferred between generations in the US alone, according to property broker Knight Frank’s 2024 Wealth Report. Inevitably some of that money will find its way into business aviation. “Many first generation NetJets owners are now seeing their children becoming owners,” says Gallagher. “So, yes, we are seeing new entrants coming in but the average age of a NetJets’ owner hasn’t changed that much due to our high retention rates – around 95%.”

Younger business jet users are often linked to demand for sustainable aviation fuel (SAF). While NetJets does not see a strong link between the two, the topic is growing in importance for all users. The operator has long offered carbon offset programmes and is the largest buyer of SAF in the private aviation industry, he says.

The company has also invested significantly in infrastructure projects to support its operations. It currently has more than 12 big US property projects under development from refurbishing existing terminals to constructing new hangars. Flagship projects include a NetJets exclusive-use terminal at Harry Reid International Airport, Las Vegas due to open by 2027 and the renovation of its existing facility at Teterboro Airport just outside New York City developed in partnership with Signature Aviation.

“We have real estate projects going on in a number of different regions to ensure we can care for our growing fleet,” says Gallagher. “We also need to ensure we offer the end-to-end service experience our owners expect. It’s important we can control every aspect of the trip from embarkment on the airplane to landing and have a familiar NetJets face greeting you at both ends.”

While the main focus of the business remains North America and Europe, Gallagher is open to expansion opportunities elsewhere. NetJets previously worked in partnership with NasJet in the Middle East and currently has a limited partnership with Amber Aviation in China.

NetJets continues to evolve – it recently introduced FlightPulse; an electronic flight bag developed with GE Aerospace designed to enhance pilot decision-making, performance and flight safety. But its core principles of safety and service will remain the same, says Gallagher. “Our owners want to do more and miss less. They choose to fly with us because they know our safety record and that we can deliver better than anybody else. They also know the ultimate luxury is really the absence of worry.”

Business aviation will continue to see “a flight to quality” in response to continuing economic uncertainty, in the form of trade disputes, and geopolitical strife, he believes. And that will encourage clients to value even more the safety standards and high service qualities of trusted providers like NetJets over the next five to 10 years.

That brings us back to Gallagher’s office for those loyal client card signings. “Our chairman and I sign all the cards and through this process, I get to read a little history about these loyal owners and how they got started with NetJets. That's fun for us,” he says.

Gallagher is looking forward to signing their first 40th anniversary card next year, marking the sale of the very first fractional share sold by the company to a client that still flies with them today. And there’s every indication that those numbers will rise and that Gallagher can expect to sign many more cards in future. He might need a new pen soon.

Awarding marks out of 10 for fractional aviation

IF YOU WANT me to grade the entire class, it’s an incomplete picture, writes Doug Gollan, founder of Private Jet Card Comparisons. Some students have been doing well, while we have also seen some dropouts.

Even at the top of the class, leading companies have taken on some big projects, so they have plenty of work ahead for themselves. Overall, the market has been robust, but below the surface, it hasn’t been all roses.

Fractional operators saw tremendous growth. NetJets and Flexjet grew by around 300,000 flight hours just in North America, which is about 50% growth. Flexjet launched Europe operations. NetJets has invested again in the Asian market again. Plus, we have seen Flexjet’s record order with Embraer and NetJets has contracted options with Embraer, Textron, and Bombardier for nearly 2,000 new airplanes.

NetJets expects to take delivery of around 100 tails this year and its main constraint is how fast the OEMs can deliver. AirSprint in Canada also had key growth.

PlaneSense had similar increases between 2019 and 2024 and also expanded nationally in the US. Remember 2020 saw declines before the demand surge started in the second half of the year. NetJets was down 27% in 2020 compared with 2019.

We also lost Jet It when it shut down entirely and Volato exited its fractional programme without notice. Jet Token which, like Volato and Jet It, launched as a HondaJet fractional and changed its name to Jet AI. It then said it was going to move to the CJ4 and possibly Challengers, but is now waiting to complete the sale of its flight business to flyExclusive.

Both flyExclusive and Fly Alliance launched new and pre-owned programmes in addition to their jet card and wholesale and retail charter businesses. Airshare entered the super-midsize space and went national, moving away from very light jets and its Phenom 100 programme. ATI Jet has restarted a pre-owned programme and SkyShare has expanded its pre-owned plan in the Western US beyond turboprops.

Northern Jet merged with SpeedBird and added light jet and super-mid preowned fractional options to its longstanding Learjet programme.

Meanwhile, Premier Private Jets announced a pre-owned fractional offer but never started. FlyUSA has just announced plans to launch pre-owned, but I am still waiting for the details.

The rise and rise of fractional aviation

THERE’S NO denying the inexorable rise of fractional aviation. Over the past five years, fractional has been the best growth performer in any category of jet utilisation, says Brian Foley of Brian Foley Associates.

“To this point [in August], the worldwide fractional fleet has been continuously growing, surpassing the previous 2008 high,” he tells us. According to AMSTAT, there are now 1,546 fractional jets in operation, which compares with 758 in 2020 and now far surpasses the previous peak of 958 in 2008. Fractional deliveries accounted for 14% of all new bizjet deliveries last year.

But why? Foley believes fractional aviation offers the solution to a growing number of uncomfortable problems for whole-aircraft business jet owners. “Fractional provides cover from tax audits, flight tracking stalking, negative political rhetoric, flight shaming, environmentalists and shareholder activists,” he tells us.

Charter proved very popular during the global pandemic, but much of that activity was due to sub-charter needs of the fractional companies, he says. As the fractional fleet has now more than doubled since 2020, that supplemental need by the fractionals has vanished.

“Fractional also has the benefit of being branded – the same aircraft paint scheme, interior layouts, uniforms, etc,” says Foley. “These are features a client will seek out and for which they will pay a premium price.”

Fractional specialist Doug Gollan, founder of Private Jet Card Comparisons also thinks Covid played a pivotal role in the development of the sector. “During the Covid boom, many large players, including NetJets and Flexjet, stopped selling jet cards,” he recalls. “At the same time, virtually everyone selling jet cards extended callouts, lengthened daily minimums, and added numerous peak days and restrictions on where you could fly with your jet card hours. But in contrast, fractional programmes continued with their flexible flying terms, even if you had to wait for your aircraft to be delivered to start flying.”

Then came the flight trackers, such as Jack Sweeny, who charted every move of celebrity private jets carrying everyone from Elon Musk to Taylor Swift. “The result was HNWIs [High-Net Worth Individuals] like Bernard Arnault [head of luxury giant LVMH] selling his jet to avoid trackers and climate shamers.”

Also, fractional offered a popular supplemental lift solution for both HNWIs and corporates suffering supply chain issues and labour shortages making their aircraft unavailable for longer than usual. This was at a time when commercial carriers struggled to restore their pre-Covid network of coverage and, in the case of many regional service, gave up the goal.

“Of subscribers to Private Jet Card Comparisons who own their own private jets, 15% also have a fractional share,” says Gollan.

Fractional’s profitable future up to 2030

FRACTIONAL’S continued popularity in the years up to 2030 is assured, according to Doug Gollan, founder of Private Jet Card Comparisons. But with even greater demand will come an even greater expectation to top service. “They [fractional companies] will be pressed to maintain their higher level of reliability, flexibility and consistency that sets them apart from jet cards and ad hoc charter,” he predicts.

Gollan believes the next five years will see “a seismic shift” in how fractionals make money. “The working theory is fractionals make most of their profits buying and selling shares and airplanes as opposed to flying their clients around. However, they are both media companies and landlords,” he says. “They have the world’s most affluent consumers trapped in a locked room for hours at a time, and essentially, those metal tubes have the value of Rodeo Drive or Bond Street at 45,000 feet.”

So far, the prevailing wisdom has been that it would be an intrusion to be hawking goods and services to that captive audience. However, Gollan detects that may be about to change as fractional operators realise the value of clienteling – or selling people things they didn’t know they wanted through a personalised approach.

“There’s a reason Louis Vuitton, Dior, Gucci, and Cartier have boutiques in St Barts and Cannes as well as Paris and New York. The folks flying in those planes [business jets] love to shop. Shopping and travel go hand-in-hand,” he says.

Brian Foley, president at Brian Foley Associates also believes fractional and to a lesser extent charter should continue their gains – particularly at the expense of traditional Part 91 flight departments.

But he senses recent giant orders may be overblown. “The recent record-setting fractional aircraft orders are more of a strategic move for fractional providers to get aircraft if and when they need them,” he tells us. “The number of aircraft ordered far exceeds any reasonable growth expectation of their industry.”

Foley also worries that large aircraft orders from fractionals may have an unforeseen consequences elsewhere. “An increase in fractional prominence will come at a cost to others in the industry, as their large fleets and scale can command deep discounts and concessions from OEMs and service providers.”

WINGX: NetJets is ‘King of the Fractional Hill’

NetJets enjoys (for now) an unassailable lead in the North American fractional market. We explore the company’s recent and future performance in a seeming ever improving market, with flight data consultancy WINGX as our guide.

NETJETS WILL be king of the fractional hill for the foreseeable future,” according to Richard Koe, MD of WINGX Advance. “No other single operator gets close to NetJets’ double-digit share of all business jet flight activity globally.”

But it is a far from uncontested crown. “NetJets has relatively very small share of flight activity in fast-growing markets like Brazil, Saudi Arabia and China,” says the MD of WINGX, now a JETNET company. On inter-continental business jet sectors outside the US, Vista Global has a stronger footprint. Also, Flexjet may be growing faster but enjoys much less share and scale.

Fractional operators were clearly the big winners of the post-Covid increase in business jet demand. But this is not the first time the fractional product has boomed. “Back in the first decade of this century, NetJets and the likes of Flexjet and now-defunct Flight Options doubled the size of their membership, until their bubble swiftly burst after 2008,” Koe tells us. This time, growth could be more long-lived, he adds. “The growth in fractional looks more sustainable, with strong drivers from changing user behaviour, partly from the experience of the pandemic, partly as a new demographic moves into the user market.”

Join us as we dive into a deeper, data-based analysis of the fractional market and NetJets place within it, courtesy of WINGX.

CJI: How has fractional performed over the past five years?

WINGX: Of all the principal operator types tracked by WINGX – management, branded charter, private, corporate and fractional – fractional ownership fleets have seen by far the strongest growth over the past six years, both in terms of size of fleet and flown hours. Flights operated by fractional operators increased from 416,000 during 2019 to 676,000 in 2024, representing a 10.2% compound annual growth rate.

This year, to date, has seen 421,000 fractional flights, 9.4% up on comparable 2024. And yet, fractional operations are still representing only 6% of the active business jet aircraft globally this year. Their contribution to activity is outsized, comprising 28% of flights during the past 12 months compared with 16% back in 2019.

CJI: Why is fractional so popular?

WINGX: The discreet form of jet ownership is less visible than aircraft ownership. The data clearly reflects a broader market shift toward asset-light business models in private aviation. This became evident during Covid, when the need for convenience unscheduled trips – and the grounding of many privately held aircraft – provided a massive boost to charter markets.

Capacity-constrained, charter operators were struggling to fulfil lift by 2022 and many new users were finding that spot-market charters were getting expensive and unreliable. The fractional operators took a while longer than charter operators to ramp up their fleets; having sold many more fractions in the early days of the Covid pandemic. By 2022 they were able to meet their customers’ needs with their own fleet (at least some of the early boost to charter came from fractional operators leasing in charter aircraft).

Since then, fractional sales have flourished from two directions – from charter customers who sought more reliable programmatic fleet service and from private and corporate owners looking for asset-light, hassle-free service. This reflected partly, the hassle concerns, costs and regulatory overheads of aircraft ownership. Plus, the reputational headache of visibly owning a luxury and climate-polluting asset such as a business jet.

The owner of a fractional share will not be listed as a sole owner for any aircraft on the FAA registry. So, they can fly without worrying that their movements are being exposed to anyone tracking live flights.

CJI: Who are the leading players and how are they doing?

WINGX: NetJets dominates the fractional market with more than 282,000 flights so far this year (January – July 2025) and 819 active aircraft. Next comes Flexjet with more than 102,000 flights and 322 active aircraft. These two operators serve about 90% of the hours flown in the global fractional business jet market this year.

The addressable market for the leading fractional operators should also include the leading charter programme providers, principally long-standing incumbent Vista Global, which serves the same customers with the same profile of ultra long-range large cabin business jet.

Across the broader market, flyExclusive and Wheels Up are important programme providers to travellers in midsize and light jets. Taking these leading five fleet operators, WINGX data shows they operate 63% of all fractional and charter hours in 2025, up from 53% five years ago. This shows that the leading operators are clearly consolidating the market.

CJI: How has NetJets fared over the past five years?

WINGX: NetJets remains the undisputed leader in fractional ownership, and indeed across all business jet operators, with a fleet larger than that of most the commercial airlines. Looking just at the addressable market for charter and fractional customers, NetJets increased its market share from 32% in 2019 to 36% in 2025, a 4% gain in an expanding market. The company’s flight operations grew from about 176,000 January – July 2019, to more than 282,000 in July 2025. For the first seven months of this year NetJets has achieved 9% flight growth compared with last year and 5% fleet growth, indicating healthy demand for its services.

CJI: What’s the future of fractional up to 2030?

WINGX: We forecast that the strongest growth in the business jet market in the next five years will be in asset-light operations, particularly in super-mid and long-range aircraft. Clearly the leading fleet operators are investing heavily in these aircraft and are attracting investment for doing so – both Flexjet and Vista Jet have demonstrated this during the spring and early summer.

Fractional programmes are most embedded in the North American market and this region will continue to contribute the lion’s share of growth in the 2020s. Fractional products have a relatively minor share of the European market, and we see that growing fast, noting Flexjet growth at the top end, and the success of companies like Jetfly in the smaller cabin market.

In other regions, charter programme operators like Vista Global have had more success than the leading fractional operators and we expect this trend to continue. We expect also the emergence of well-funded local programme operators in regional markets where there is evidently strong growth in demand – in the Gulf countries and in Brazil to name two.

Fleet data shows the number of active jets in the fractional segment growing at a 4.9% compound annual growth rate (CAGR) from 2019 through to 2024 – the fastest among all business models.

Given the current growth momentum in the industry and market share expansion, fractional activities could capture up to 35% of business jet activity by 2030 if current trends continue. Several factors support continued growth: increased wealth concentration requiring discrete aviation solutions, corporate preferences for variable cost structures over fixed assets and the operational efficiency advantages of professional fleet management.

The market consolidation among leading operators should drive further service quality improvements. However, it should be noted that growth could moderate from the current exceptional levels as the segment matures and faces potential headwinds such as pilot availability, industry regulation and supply chain constraints.

RICHARD KOE, MD, WINGX ADVANCE

Fractional operators, like NetJets, are clearly the big winners of the post-Covid increase in business jet demand, according to Richard Koe of WINGX.

The Embraer Praetor 500 is the newest addition to the NetJets Aviation fleet.

Mike Stones, Reporter, Corporate Jet Investor