Sentient Jet
Expanding its network in the United States and overseas.

Sentient Jet has designed its Private Jet Membership Program so that it offers clients the simplicity and choice of chartering with the service and reliability of fractional or outright ownership. Membership takes the form of a debit account and is available in two basic levels: Silver, for $100,000, and Gold, priced at $250,000. In both cases, you pay no other up-front costs and are given no time limit for using the travel that you have purchased. Perhaps best of all, if your travel needs change, and remaining balances are fully refundable.

A nationwide fleet of jets participates in Sentient's program, which eliminates most positioning fees that a traditional charter operator might charge. Also, because Sentient's pricing is set in advance, with fixed hourly rates that are based on the aircraft selected, you know what your next flight will cost. For example, for a Select group plan, which includes pre-owned aircraft, Sentient would deduct from your account approximately $2,250 for each round-trip hour aboard a Learjet 31 or comparable aircraft. When flying a heavy Challenger 604 on a one-way flight in a Preferred-level plan that is brand-new, the tab would run approximately $10,000 per hour. Sentient's client management consultants will help you decide which aircraft is the best fit for your planned flight, and choices range from Citation, Learjet, or Beechjet as the light-jet extreme to the Challenger, Falcon 900, or Gulfstream IV-SP at the heavy-jet end of the spectrum.

Not content to rest on its laurels as a premier charter broker, the company recently began branching out. In April, Sentient announced it had acquired Atlantic Aviation Flight Services, a 75-year-old aircraft management and charter operator with an operations base at Teterboro, N.J., airport, and facilities in seven other states. The deal will add 13 more popular aircraft to Sentient's network, enhancing its ability to meet the growing demand for its transportation services.

In late April, Sentient Jet announced its new alliance with London-based Air Partner - a public company with a 40-year track record in the private jet business - which will enable Sentient to expand its fleet and its service overseas. With the new partnership, Sentient Jet will be able to provide what CEO Steve Hankin calls "seamless, intra-Europe travel with the world's broadest private travel program." Hankin says that the alliance with Air Partner and the accompanying access to a wide range of jets based throughout the world, including a Boeing 747, means Sentient is now "quite capable of providing the same level of customer confidence to traveling around the world" as it has for the those traveling throughout the United States.

In addition to customer convenience, Sentient stresses safety: The aircraft in its network always are operated under the more-stringent FAA rules regulating on-demand charters; those flown by many fractional services are not. The charter rules concerning safety issues - such as weather conditions and runway lengths - and security. The FAA also requires pilots flying aircraft offered by Sentient Jet to have more experience than a crew flying for a fractional operator. To evaluate the aircraft and pilots in its network, the company employs the services of Aviation Research Group U.S. (ARG/US) and Wyvern Consulting Ltd., two leading authorities on private aviation safety. And Sentient has formed its own internal safety panel - the Sentient Jet Safety Committee - whose members include former FAA head Jane Garvey.

- Joseph E. Burnside