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More Japanese Start Boarding Private Jets

Posted on: Friday, 16 September 2005, 12:00 CDT

Sep. 16--TOKYO -- With the catchphrase of "Why don't you get into my 'flying my car'?" major trading companies are providing private jets to corporate bigwigs and rich travelers.

A plane leased by ShareJet, a U.S. company, via Sojitz Holdings Co., is equipped with beds, showers and toiletries.

The plane is a modified Boeing 737 passenger plane that normally seats about 200 passengers. This number is limited to 18 to give them ample space with sofas and desks.

The hourly fee is $12,500 (1.37 million yen). And customers tend to be mostly rich people, including members of royal families.

A foreign businessman who has used the plane said it is attractive because it you can take a shower and change. Japanese working in the information-technology field have also made use of it, and Sojitz said it wants to increase these customers.

Marubeni Corp. has been a sales agent in Japan for jet planes built by Gulfstream of the United States since 1998, selling planes capable of carrying seven to 19 passengers at 1.5 billion yen to 5 billion yen. It recently strengthened services for body maintenance and procuring pilots.

In the last seven years, Marubeni has sold more than 20 private jets to major firms and the Japan Coast Guard. Itochu Corp. is also active in selling planes built by Cessna of the United States.

"There are many overseas investors living in local areas far from hub airports, and it is convenient for them to go to three or four places in a day," said a Marubeni official.

According to Sojitz, there are about 13,000 private jets throughout the world, but only a few of them have Japanese owners.

The main reason is that Japan is not so airport-friendly and does not have enough airports operating around the clock, it said.

But the popularity of these planes is rising in tandem with globalization, say business analysts.

Toyota Motor Corp. uses a few private planes for its top executives. A Toyota spokesperson said: "They can move anytime without a transfer. As time is money, total expenses are not high." Masaki Nakatani, secretary general of the Japan Business Aviation Association, said, "Demand chiefly in Asia for corporate jets that can let people move quickly is growing."

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Source: Kyodo News International, Tokyo

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