Jetrader - Summer 2018 - 40

aviation insights

A Conversation with CDB
Aviation President and CEO

Peter Chang

The latest installment of ISTAT Aviation Insights, sponsored by PwC, returns with a conversation with another industry veteran.
James Meyler, CEO, ORIX Aviation Hong Kong, and deputy CEO, ORIX Aviation Group, sat down with Peter Chang, president and
CEO of CDB Aviation.
What follows are some highlights from the conversation between these two industry leaders, but be sure to check out the full video
on ISTAT's YouTube page at http://bit.ly/ISTATYouTube, and be on the lookout for more interviews throughout the year.

James Meyler: Peter, this year has been a
transformational year for CDB Aviation.
You've emerged with a new, international management team, and you're
a top-10 lessor now with over 200 aircraft currently in the fleet plus another
over 200 on order, which brings you to
400-plus aircraft. Would you like to give
us some insights on both yourself and
CDB aviation?
Peter Chang: It has been a very exciting
year. It's amazing that since we started what
we will consider as CDB 3.0 in December of
last year that we have increased the platform from approximately 28 employees -
28 professionals - to close to 100. If
you were to ask me if that was possible a
year ago, I would probably have thought
it was a pipe dream. We're very grateful
and humbled to have not only the number
of professionals in the business who have
joined us, but the quality of people. These
are fairly senior people, and we were very
surprised that in an industry where talent
is typically known as very difficult to find,
we were able to attract so much of it.
In terms of CDB Bank, we have a responsibility in the mission of not only facilitating national projects domestically, such as
financing the nuclear power plants, and
the highways and infrastructure projects,

but extending in other ways - [such as]
the "One Belt, One Road" program. It is
becoming the financial arm for the state
into the international arena. It became
involved with aviation leasing, primarily because the aviation industry was
considered by the Chinese government
as one of the core strategic industries.
When aviation came along, they wanted
to make sure that they had one of their
stronger financial cornerstones as part of
the industry.
JM: If you talk more specifically on CDB
aviation, you have over 200 aircraft in

40 The official publication of the International Society of Transport Aircraft Trading

the fleet and many aircraft on order.
What's your vision? Where do you see
CDB Aviation Leasing being in five years'
and ten years' time in terms of numbers?
PC: I discussed [the business model] with
our board members in the very beginning,
and in view of the comparative advantage
of the CDB Bank, the question was: "What
is the most suitable scale for an ownership
like CDB?" Considering we had 185 airplanes
at that time, we wanted to get to a level
that would necessitate a platform. So at
the time, what we said was "600 airplanes."
And the reason for 600 airplanes - and
not necessarily because investment grades

http://www.bit.ly/ISTATYouTube

Jetrader - Summer 2018

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