Page 26 - AAA NOVEMBER - DECEMBER 2018 Online Magazine

have a hangar that is equipped to handle a narrow body aircraft the system is the ability to use laptop com-
for painting; you can put one or two aircraft nosed in behind puters for our inspectors and maintenance
it as well,” says Gray. “That way, we can work on two or three personnel so that we can sign off electroni-
aircraft at the same time. ‘In Sanford, we have the MRO, which cally. We then print the paper work and sign it.
does A checks, B checks and C checks; we have multiple aircraft Eventually, we will go to all digital. The system
there,” says Gray. also tracks our parts and man power.”

“We also have a teardown facility where we disas- Emerging Opportunity
semble multiple aircraft; we have a 777, an A 321, ray believes it is important for
A340, A 319, DC-10s, 737s. MD-80s and 727s. We companies to be nimble on their
buy and sell aircraft parts as well. The tear down feet to identify and seize evolv-
facility is working very well; so is the parts company. Ging opportunities. With FAA’s Jan.
The MRO part of our business is growing as well.” 1,2020 deadline for U.S. airlines to become
Edward Gray, General Manager and Chief of Operations at equipped with automatic dependent surveil-
Avocet Aviation Services lance-broadcast (ADS-B) looming, he says
that the company is eager to corner a siz-
The company has leasing companies as well as airlines among able portion of the installation work. “ADS-B
its growing list of customers. Our main customer is Precision, is very big right now, we are working with two
but we work with a lot of other companies,” says Gray. “We engineering companies to do ADS-B on the
have Laser, a South American company. We have Italy-based classics. It is 2020 when it is coming, and
Advantage, we are doing work on the MD-380 for them. We it is 2018 now; nobody is thinking about it
also have customers through three different leasing companies until it is too late. We are being very proactive.
that we work with.” Basically, what we do is we cut the middle-
man out; we get the airlines or the companies
With digitalization taking deep roots in the industry, companies to come in through us. We use our STC and
have been eager to digitize their operations. Avocet is no differ- move them out quickly. It is a lot faster and
ent. “We have a computer system called Pentagon that we are smoother when they work with us. We have
updating,” says Gray. “One of the things that we are growing in the manpower and the experience.”

26 | November/December 2018 www.GBP.com.sg/AAA