In the newly released year end 2021 edition of the Asia-Pacific Business Jet Fleet Report from Asian Sky Media there were 1,215 business jets operating in the Asia Pacific region at the end of December 2021, a decrease of 1.1 per cent from the end of 2020. Overall, there were 33 new deliveries, 68 pre-owned additions and 114 deductions, which contributed to a net decline of 13 business jets from the fleet.

“One always ends the year knowing how your business did, but with only an inkling for how the overall business aviation industry faired in Asia Pacific. For 10 years now, Asian Sky Media has strived to dispel those feelings you might have and replace them impartially with the hard, cold facts. This often leads to surprises, and 2021 didn't disappoint in that it wasn't as bad as we might of thought it was going to be,” says Jeffrey C Lowe, director, Asian Sky Group and Asian Sky Media.

Mainland China remains the largest market in the Asia Pacific region. Despite headlines earlier in the year suggesting that a large number of aircraft had left the Chinese fleet, mainland China's fleet declined by 1.7 per cent in 2021 with a net loss of just six aircraft. Hong Kong, the region's fourth-largest market, saw the most net declines with a total of 19 jets leaving the fleet. Japan saw the most additions with eight aircraft entering the country, helping the fleet grow by 14 per cent.

The number of pre-owned business jets entering the fleet grew by 28 per cent in 2021, increasing from 53 in 2020 to 68 in 2021. New deliveries in the region continued their decline, with the 33 in 2021 being 13 per cent fewer than the 38 new deliveries in 2020. Bombardier overtook Gulfstream and became the OEM that delivered the most business jets into the APAC region in 2021, with 12 units in total, making up 36 per cent of total new deliveries.

Sino Jet was again the biggest operator in the region with a fleet of 46 business jets, a net reduction of one aircraft from the previous year. 2020's second-biggest operator TAG Aviation saw a net reduction of six aircraft from its fleet in 2021, enabling BAA to take its place as the second-biggest operator and Deer Jet as the third. BAA's fleet saw no net reductions during the year, while Deer Jet saw one. Overall, none of the top five operators saw net additions to their fleets; instead they saw a combined net deduction of 16 aircraft during the year.

Special features in the 10th anniversary edition include a look at the number of business jets in a country versus its population size and the number of billionaires. This can be used as a proxy to determine how developed the business aviation market is in individual countries, with the most developed having a higher number of business jets per capita/billionaires. New Zealand tops the list with 14.5 business jets per billionaire, whilst South Korea comes last with just 0.47.

The full Asia-Pacific Business Jet Fleet Report YE2021 is now available on the Asian Sky Media website.