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The business jet maker Hawker Beechcraft is readying a bankruptcy filing BY MICHAEL J. DE LA MERCED AND PETER LATTMAN The business jet maker Hawker Beechcraft is readying a bankruptcy filing, people briefed on the matter said on Wednesday, dealing a blow to its private equityowners, Goldman Sachs and Onex Partners. Hawker, which is based in Wichita, Kan., said on Tuesday that it had obtained $120 million in additional loans to buy it time to fix its balance sheet. In exchange, a majority of the company’s debt holders agreed to defer some interest payments and grant relief from loan covenants.

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Between exhausting lines at security and countless flight delays and cancellations, the concept of a “quick flight” no longer exists. In reaction, many corporations are taking matters into their own hands by investing in corporate jets to fly executives and employees on business trips. For many companies, it is the time savings that turns them onto private jetting. Daniel Jennings, CEO of the Private Jet Company, said that since October 2010, his inquiries from companies looking to purchase private jets have doubled. “Once you are a company that starts having operations regionally and nationally, it gets difficult to do visits in

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Even the bad times can be good for the men and women in the frontline This issue, EBAN begins a series of features looking at the issues facing a particular group of business aviation professionals. ‘Perspectives’ will sound out decision makers on their working life, how they overcome problems and their hopes for the future. The aircraft salesman has to learn how to cope with the stress of working with extremely demanding clients across multiple time zones that can be as much as 17 hours apart in order to cope with a lifestyle that is less glamorous than it appears

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Warren Buffett jumped into a new line of work – financing private aircraft. Buffett started hawking little-money-down, low rate, quick-approval loans on a lifestyle-changing purchase. No, America’s wealthiest man isn’t selling subprime mortgages, he has introduced a financing arm to his NetJets unit aimed at helping the well-heeled keep up their luxury-jet lifestyles by loaning them cash to fly on his fleet of 800 planes, which lost a ton of money last year but posted pre-tax profits of $158 million in the first nine months of 2010. Buffett’s NetJets, which sells air travel by the hour aboard posh private jets and

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