Ward sells Norse Air Charter

NORSE AIR Charter has a new owner.
After 12 years spent building the company into a major force in the local airfreight charter market, Deirdre Ward has sold to Dave Avnit and Nadja Venter whose involvement in the aviation industry provides a launch pad for the development of Norse Air from an airfreight broker into other aviation activities, encompassing ownership of aircraft.
Ward will continue her involvement in Norse and maintains her position as a director of the company.
Norse Air Charter adds a further string to the Avnit/Venter aviation portfolio. Their current business base comprises Strato Air Services, which owns seven aircraft and operates a domestic cheque courier operation, and SASI, the investment arm of the company owning various aircraft.
The idea is to tap into the synergies between the charter side, the Strato operations and aircraft ownership. Norse Air has entered into a joint venture with Volare Volga, one of Ukraine's largest aircraft operators.
"The combination of charter, aircraft ownership and operations creates a formidable force in the airfreight industry," says Venter.
Avnit, who has always had a passion for flying and is a commercially rated pilot, comes from a financial services industry background. "It's a question of finding creative ways of financial structuring, looking for contracts, buying an aircraft based on those contracts and putting it into the contract. You then obtain a dollar-based income with rand costs." And this is where he believes that the new acquisition fits well into the company's future thinking.
Norse Air currently operates eight Ilyushin 76 aircraft, two Antonov 12s and one Antonov 26 in a joint venture with Volare Volga. It also retains its general sales agency for Antonov/
Heavylift Airlines affording access to six Antonov 124s (100 ton capacity) and one Antonov 225 (200 ton capacity). Norse also has access to Tristars, B707s, B747s and DC 8s.
The company moves a diverse range of cargo from mining and military equipment to vehicles, animals and heavy machinery mainly into southern and northern Africa.
Charter business into Africa is feast or famine, says Ward, dictated largely by politics. However she believes the potential in Africa is limitless. "Security is so poor by truck and the infrastructure in many African states is so underdeveloped that although airfreight is more expensive, in the bigger picture it often makes financial sense."
According to Ward last year was the company's best, the successful completion of the first phase of the Vodacom installation in the DRC spearheaded by Brolaz projects bearing testimony to the general upward investment trend into Africa over the past 18 months.
Immediate plans, says Venter, will be to consolidate and build on Norse Air's successful track record.