Bahrain's Bexair believes that Citations are the aircraft to cement its expansion on routes in the Middle East while the Challenger is ideally suited to its inter-continental business.

"We want to build on our reputation as being one of the biggest and most efficient private charter operators of these two types of aircraft in the Middle East," says ceo Mansour Al-Tassan.

But Bexair, which has just ordered a Challenger 605, is looking at diversifying its fleet with orders from Dassault.

"We are looking for another type of aircraft in 2008/09, possibly the Falcon 2000," Al-Tassan says. "We have been operating Challenger 604s and Citations. We will, of course, continue in a big way with Bombardier and Cessna aircraft. The Challenger 604 is much in demand, particularly to intercontinental destinations including Europe and Asia. The Citations are very popular aircraft and are integral to our plans to cover the Middle East."

He adds: "We have coordinated plans to expand our fleet, our aircraft operations and our maintenance section. We see our main base in Manama as becoming established as an integrated executive aviation facility. The business plan for the next five years is to develop Bexair to fully cover the Middle East and Asia."

Al-Tassan, who followed his father into aviation, has brought his 28 years experience in the industry, spanning both maintenance and management, to bear as he further builds Bexair.

"We provide consultancy services to help the client choose the right aircraft," he says. "When you do a good job in this regard clients will entrust the management to you. If, in addition, you can offer reliable maintenance and a strong spread of suitable aircraft choice for charter, then you will do very well."

Bexair has grown particularly strongly in the important Saudi Arabian market. It has built a fleet that includes three Challenger 604s, a

601-3R, two Legacy 600s, a Citation Excel and an XLS. A second XLS is joining the fleet.

"We are excited about the addition of the 605," says Al-Tassan. "The cabin is spacious and bright. It has a new top-of-the-line avionics suite and an increased payload capacity. It can whisk five passengers from Geneva to New York or Paris to Delhi non-stop."