Dubai Aerospace Enterprise (DAE) Ltd. is to sell a portfolio of 18 mid-life aircraft to institutional investors, with the planes currently on lease to 15 airlines.
The lessor has entered into a definitive sale agreement to sell the aircraft portfolio, which are currently operating from 13 countries. They have a weighted average age of approximately nine years, and a weighted average remaining lease term of 4.5 years.
The portfolio consists of 69% current generation narrowbodies, 24% widebodies and 7% ATR72-600 turboprops.
DAE says it will continue to act as the portfolio servicer. Firoz Tarapore, the lessor’s CEO, commented: “We continue to build our managed aircraft portfolio. This transaction takes us one step closer to our stated goal of having US$5 billion of managed aircraft assets. Investors are increasingly recognising the value of DAE’s Aircraft Investor Services (AIS) platform and entrusting the management of their aircraft assets to us. So far, we have continued to outperform our investors’ expectations in all the portfolios we manage.”
DAE also last week announced that its Amman-based engineering and MRO entity Joramco had renewed an agreement with Dubai-based low-fare carrier flydubai to provide the latter with heavy maintenance solutions for its fleet of Boeing 737 aircraft. Under the agreement, Joramco will perform up to 45 ‘C’ checks and Entry-Into-Service checks from January 2019. It will also perform avionics and cabin modifications including broad band modifications.
Joramco first began working with flydubai in 2013. “In the past five years, Joramco has played an important role in our operations by fulfilling our MRO requirements,” said Mick Hills, senior vice-president, engineering and maintenance at the airline. “We look forward to seeing our partnership strengthen with this latest agreement as our fleet continues to grow.”
Flydubai is planning to grow its fleet over the next decade by up to 296 aircraft. It currently operates a single fleet-type of 58 B737s.
