WORKING WEEK
flightglobal.com 10-16 December 2019 | Flight International | 63
Regulatory and competitive pressures are raising costs, says Bailey
Outsourcing has a key part to play
Miles Bailey is director of sales and customer service for UK-based SmartFly, a global procurement
agency for business aviation that seeks out the best deals for clients and helps them boost efficiency
WORK EXPERIENCE MILES BAILEY
costs. Ultimately they could
forecast much better and had
improved visibility for the next
12 months, which is crucial in an
uncertain market. Each customer
must be approached differently.
Understanding how they operate
and where they can benefit from
outsourced procurement is great
fun. As no two owners or opera-
tors are identical, there’s no “one
size fits all” solution. Lastly, I’m
fortunate to travel regularly. I’m
occasionally able to fly myself to
customer meetings – which cer-
tainly provides an ice-breaker!
How do you see the SmartFly
service evolving?
As we gain more customers, our
aggregated buying power will go
from strength to strength. We’ll
have better negotiating leverage
and volume, ensuring our cus-
tomers continue to access the
best value propositions through-
out the whole supply chain.
Several exciting product
developments are in the pipeline
within our services portfolio and
in the way SmartFly will be
embracing technology. The evo-
lution of IT in private aviation
over the past 10 years has been
fascinating and I’m excited to be
playing a part in it. ■How did you get into aviation?
Aviation has been my life since I
graduated in 2006. I studied Avi-
ation Technology with Pilot
Training at Leeds University,
which set me up for the variety of
roles I’ve held over the last 13
years. Although you’re now
more likely to find me behind a
desk than in a cockpit, flying is
in my bones – at the weekends,
you’ll find me at Bicester Gliding
Centre, where I’m a volunteer tug
pilot and instructor.
How has your career progressed?
I started out as a cadet pilot with
West Atlantic Cargo, but decided
I preferred working directly with
customers to piloting. So I joined
Bookajet, a busy brokerage based
at Farnborough airport, tasked
with managing flight require-
ments using a network of
partners. From there, I held
various roles in sales, business
development and supply chain
management. I joined SmartFly
at its inception earlier this year.
What are the highlights?
I’ve been fortunate to work with
fantastic people and teams
throughout my career. All the op-
portunities I have engaged with
have been on the recommenda-
tion of others – which serves
only to reinforce the vital impor-
tance of networking and main-
taining personal relationships.
How does SmartFly work?
SmartFly was originally formed
as the outsourced procurement
partner for the Luxaviation
Group. Luxaviation was running
procurement across 14 air
operator certificates and realised
it needed an independent agency
to manage costs and strategise
spending. Now, SmartFly is
committed to helping everyone,
from individual aircraft owners to
large operators, achieve the best
value for their operation.
Procurement is about more than
just pricing – it’s about service,
value, time and strategy. Our
customers still work directly with
their suppliers – we just build
those relationships for you. For
instance, one of our customers
was having difficulty getting air-
craft parts turned around quickly,
which impacted their profit. We
reduced that from 28 to 21 days.
Can you describe your duties?
I’m involved with attracting new
business, developing strategy and
products and looking after existing
customers. I work closely with our
procurement teams to keep themappraised of our customer require-
ments, ensuring they’re prepared
when entering negotiations.
What are the challenges?
There’s a lot of global uncertainty
around business aviation today.
External pressure from regulators
and increased market
competition is causing margins to
contract and prices to escalate,
which is why having a partner
like SmartFly is so important. The
prevailing mentality is “we can’t,
because...”, which is the opposite
of my “we can, if...” outlook!
Where do you get most
enjoyment out of your job?
It’s satisfying to see first hand the
results of our efforts. For exam-
ple, for a recent customer, we
more than halved the number of
contracted providers they were
using. This boosted efficiency
and consistency and mitigatedSmartFlyIf you would like to feature in
Working Week, or you know
someone who would, email
your pitch to kate.sarsfield@
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