Jetrader - Autumn 2016 - 12

Q&A

Jetaire Group's
Mike Williams
President

By Cody Smith

Mike Williams founded Jetaire Group in 1984 to address the highly specialized certification,
manufacturing and engineering needs of such companies and institutions as Delta Airlines,
the United States Navy and more. Jetrader interviewed Williams to learn about the history
of Jetaire, how the company works with regulatory mandates, the identification of trends
impacting the manufacturing sector in the aviation industry and much more.
Jetrader: Tell us about the history
of Jetaire. How did the company get
started? How did you get started in the
aviation industry?
Mike Williams: I started the company in
1984 when I was 25-years-old. Before starting the company, I began my career as an
avionics engineer for Eastern Airlines and
Air Florida. I worked for Eastern initially
during a period of turmoil in the industry.
The company's engineering was broken up
by ATA codes, and electrical power generation and lighting were my responsibilities.
From there I went to Air Florida and
stayed there for over a year. During that
year, I gained a lot of experience in many
aspects of aircraft maintenance and engineering, including certification of new systems. The Air Florida environment required
employees to be "Swiss army knives" and
to be very good at the skill they were hired
for. I earned an A&P license and eventually qualified to become a FAA designated
engineering representative (DER).
I then returned to Eastern to a group
called "Contract Engineering." We provided
engineering services not only to Eastern,
but to smaller carriers and individual aircraft owners of large jets. We had clients
like Trump Airlines, Midway, Air Jamaica,
Adnan Khashoggi and several other VIP
clients, and they would come to Eastern
because the company had virtually anything one needed to support the aircraft.

With very short notice, Eastern decided
to eliminate contract maintenance and
engineering services, leaving customers
without engineering support. Several customers I was responsible for approached
me about providing engineering assistance
due to their need for continued engineering support.
Being young and naïve forced me to gain
an understanding of non-technical business
issues. By hiring competent consultants I
listened and learned, basically becoming a
sponge when in their presence.
JT: What were some notable early
projects?
MW: One of my first customers was
Monarch Aviation, which later became
Pemco. The previous vice president of maintenance and engineering at Air Florida,
who now worked at Monarch, brought me
onboard. He needed mechanical and electrical systems designed for a DC9 cargo
door for the Navy and Monarch didn't have
electrical or hydraulic engineering in place
to develop it. That was my first huge project under Jetaire, putting my career on a
whole different trajectory.
Twenty years ago we became more of
a product development company and we
developed products to satisfy FAA mandates primarily. My work with Monarch
helped teach me how to design and certify smoke detection and fire suppression

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

systems. After the ValuJet Flight 592 accident in May 1996, we were hired by Delta
Airlines to develop a smoke and fire detection system for their fleet of narrow-bodied
aircraft. It was one of the reasons why I
decided to move to Atlanta.
JT: What services does Jetaire provide
to companies in the aviation industry?
Why should companies pick Jetaire over
other companies?
MW: Some of the other large system companies traditionally do not have people
on their staff who can develop STCs and
installation kits for various airframes. They
develop the computers, and the end user
has to find a way of getting the system
integrated into their aircraft and then certified, which we provide.
An example of this philosophy is our
"INVICTA" (Greek for unconquerable, unsubdued and invincible) solution to the FAA
requirement for center wing tank inerting
(SFAR 88 and 25.981). We took an approach
that had never been successfully certified in commercial aviation and brought
it to market.
We are an FAA Design Approval Holder
(DAH) and design high-reliability hardware
and systems that provide critical functions
where durability and peak performance are
vital, including military and commercial
aviation in addition to aerospace and space
industries.
We also hold Parts Manufacturing Approval
(PMA) on all of our STCs and provide complete modification services including engineering, design, manufacture, integration/
certification, STC Development, FAA certification assistance and regulatory consulting.

Jetrader - Autumn 2016

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