Air Partner’s Freight division has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Air Cargo Integrators of the UAE which will see the two companies working together to develop both their freight charter and global air freight products. Under the terms of the deal, Air Partner Freight has appointed Air Cargo Integrators (ACI) as its official freight sales and marketing representative in the Middle East hub of the UAE in order to develop its aircraft charter and project air cargo charter products.
In turn, ACI has appointed Air Partner Freight as its sales and marketing partner in Europe and the Americas for the company’s Air Direct Connect airline product. By virtue of the new agreement, Air Partner’s representative office in the UAE will now be provided by ACI and clients will have full visibility of both companies at all times.
Th e deal comes after a sustained period of co-operation between both companies in the provision of aircraft charter and air freight services to a shared customer base within Europe and the UAE and represents a re-consolidation of Air Partner’s fast growing Freight product in the Middle East region.
Air Partner is a global aviation services group that provides high value aviation solutions in the areas of aircraft charter and remarketing, specialist travel management, aviation safety & security and crisis & emergency planning. The company has its headquarters in London Gatwick and has 20 offices globally across four continents with 240 staff . Th e group includes the leading aviation brands Air Partner (aircraft charter), Cabot Aviation (aircraft sale and remarketing) and Baines Simmons (aviation safety consultancy).
Air Partner’s Freight division is globally represented with offices across Europe and the US, providing aircraft charter, part-charter, on-board carry and urgent air freight forwarding solutions for a number of national and international organisations. Th ese include the oil & gas, automotive and commercial aviation sectors, governments worldwide (including six of the G8 group of governments), NGOs and aid agencies, as well as international and UK royalty.
The company is also an Indirect Air Carrier in the US.
Air Cargo Integrators is a UAEbased provider of neutral air cargo consolidation solutions and supplier of freighter and passenger aircraft solutions to difficult-to-reach places in the Middle East and Africa. Th e company has been present in the UAE since 2001, with its head offices located in Dubai and warehousing based in DWC Dubai and Sharjah airports. ACI has long been known internationally for its own controlled freighter capacity to Iraq and Afghanistan and it complements these products with in-house services such as cargo acceptance, warehousing, documentation, cargo clearance and wider freight forwarding services by air and sea.
ACI also benefits from being an airfreight carrier, by way of being able to off er the AWB services of its partner company, Air Direct Connect, an IATA cargo carrier with a network across the Middle East and East/Central Africa. ACI is also due to shortly break ground on a new facility in the DWC airport area.
“The UAE marketplace is such a vital logistics platform for the wider MEA region,” said Stuart Smith, global business development manager for Air Partner Freight. “Despite some of the wider difficulties facing a number of traditional air charter industries around the world, the Middle East – and the UAE in particular – remains a vibrant market in which to offer creative airfreight solutions to a wide sector client base.
“More than ever and as our industry peers have also recognised, charter companies must step up to the plate and provide added value services to their clients. Air Partner remains a true aviation specialist, and we are pleased to have found a partner like ACI, which really understands the nuances of the UAE market and will enable us to widen our product offering and allow us to off er ever more innovative solutions to clients,” Smith said.
Noting the long-standing relationship between ACI and Air Partner for a number of years, Lionel Smith, CEO for Air Cargo Integrators said: “Our focus, as always, is to provide enhanced and innovative products that will improve connectivity to multiple destinations without compromise on quality and safety, which is our priority, and the collaboration with Air Partner will make it easier for customers and major freight forwarders to entrust ACI/AP for seamless air solutions.”
