ISTAT Jetrader - Spring 2021 - 20

important to have it in every setting.
To me, diversity is not about quotas
and forced recruitment of a certain
type of person; I think it's about giving
everybody an equal opportunity and
giving people a chance, regardless of
their creed, sex or background.
On the experience of launching a
new company:
It was a very exciting time to start on
our own. We started just before the
Dublin January conferences, and it
was really exciting to see people that
we knew and say, well, we're doing
something new and different, and this
is who we are. There is nothing like
that excitement. After several years
of working for Airclaims, which later
became Ascend, I convinced my then
boss to go out on our own. It was a
big launch because of leaving the
safety of a large organization and a
monthly paycheck and doing it on
your own. Having Les Weal on board
was brilliant. By that time, I had been
in the industry for over 10 years, and
Les had been for as long as anybody
could remember. That allowed us to
create a network of contacts, and
that's the most important thing in
the consultancy business. I don't
think aircraft appraising is something
that you can just walk into from the
street. Luckily for us, a lot of people
knew and trusted us personally as
appraisers and were happy for us
to set up a business and rely on our
integrity and experience as individuals
to build our own brand in the market.
Many have welcomed new appraisal
companies because they don't get
created very often, and the market
likes the variety of opinion that
is offered by appraisers. We had
immense support after we started,
and when we looked back after three
years, we were much further ahead
than where we would have expected to
be. It's amazing.
20

* T H E O F F I C I A L P U B L I C AT I O N O F I S TAT

Mark Calver
CEO of Aeronave Company
ISTAT Certified Senior Appraiser
*Aired on 6 November 2020

On being an apprentice at British
Airways during strikes:
As apprentices, we used to wear
green overalls so that we were easily
identified in the workforce. The rules
at the time were that apprentices were
not required to be part of any kind of
industrial action, and we weren't part of
the unions and weren't required to be.
But we did have some industrial action
in British Airways. I think it was around
1980, and I can remember a pretty
frightening morning, arriving at work on
an early shift during the winter months.
I used to go into work by motorcycle,
so, of course, I didn't have my overalls
on; I was dressed in normal protective
gear to ride the bike. I arrived at the
picket lines and had to convince the
guys that I was an apprentice going
to work. " You can't stop me going
through, I have to go to work. If I don't
report, I'm in trouble. " It was quite a
difficult time because you've got all
these guys standing around trying to
listen to the conversation, looking at
you, calling you a scab because you
want to go through the picket lines. It
was quite a stressful thing to have to do
as a young lad.
On working for Richard Branson:
He's a fun guy to work for. I met with
him several times. I can remember
having a product board meeting many,
many moons ago. I was invited to it
because Richard wanted to talk about
some modifications that he wanted on
one of the aircraft. He had just won

some industry awards, and he wanted
these awards displayed in the aircraft,
and no one had really explained to him
the process of what's involved with
even a minor modification and getting
it approved by the regulatory body and
then installing it on the airplane. So,
I came to this meeting, and I knew
Richard was hot under the collar about
this whole issue, but it was amazing.
I sat there and explained to him the
whole process that we have to go
through and why it takes time to do
this stuff, and he just looked at me
said, " Thanks for explaining. At least I
know how long it takes. " And I thought
" You know, this guy does listen. " I was
expecting to get a chewing out at the
board meeting, but he listened to what
the situation was. He was a practical
guy when it came to these sorts of
matters. I did several trips where
Richard would be on the airplane, and
he used to put the uniforms on and
have fun with the passengers. He's a
character for sure.
On transitioning from the airline side
to the lessor side on the industry:
In my time at Virgin, I'd been very
fortunate to be exposed at a fairly
young age to commercial contracts.
We'd met with the manufacturers to
talk about new aircraft orders. I'd had
several lease negotiation discussions
with different lessors on the 747s that
Virgin had, plus an A320 for a Virgin
affiliate based in Greece. When Virgin
introduced the A340s and the 747-400s
into the fleet, I did all of the sourcing
and negotiations - commercial
negotiations for the support contracts
that we put in place for not just
maintenance, but spare parts, supplies
and stuff like that. So, I'd already
done a lot of negotiations from the
airline perspective, so moving into the
leasing side, it was a case of turning
it around the other way and looking at
what I need to achieve for the lessor,
knowing how the airlines were going
to be using the airplane and what that
meant to the airline. I found it helped
ISTAT Jetrader - Spring 2021

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