Germany's ProAir is seeking a year of consolidation next year, having inducted six aircraft to its fleet in 2017. General manager Andreas Wald says that he has been very busy with large group charters, including sports teams and music groups. “We hope to continue and grow our market presence in the business, executive and sports segments, where we have had a remarkable number of global stars among our customers. We handle charter flights and baggage logistics at automotive events with thousands of participants, and hopefully we can develop this further.”

ProAir started in 1996 as a charter broker for small cargo missions in Europe. It added a leased King Air 200 and before long this twin prop was exceeding 1,100 hours annually.

“One of our first executive customers was very happy with our service but he wanted the use the aircraft exclusively,” Wald continues. “This resulted in him buying a Falcon 900 that we managed for him. We founded ProAir Aviation as an AOC holder in 2006.”

The company's fleet soon grew to 14 aircraft and included Challengers, a Falcon 7X and a Gulfstream 550. “Having operated the majority of the aircraft for Russian and Ukrainian customers at that time, we saw many of the aircraft being sold following the eastern Ukrainian crisis, which reduced us to six aircraft.” Today the fleet totals 15 aircraft and includes the Cessnas, Learjets, Challengers and two CRJ200s.

TecAvia, the Part 145 maintenance side of the business that was founded in 2010, has a base at Leipzig airport, and Wald says that this arm of the ProAir operation has also enjoyed a great deal of activity in 2017.