Business jet

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Raytheon Hawker 800 business jet (previously known as the DH125, then HS125, then British Aerospace 125)

Bombardier Global Express business jet

Business jet, private jet or, colloquially, bizjet is a term describing a jet aircraft, usually of smaller size, designed for transporting groups of business people. Business jets may be adapted for other roles, such as the evacuation of casualties or express parcel deliveries, and a few may be used by public bodies, governments or the armed forces. The more formal terms of corporate jet, executive jet, VIP transport or business jet tend to be used by the firms that build, sell, buy and charter these aircraft.

1 Background
2 Classes
3 List of Business jets
4 See also

Background

Almost all production business jets, such as General Dynamics' Gulfstream and the Gates Lear Jet (now built by Bombardier), have had two or three engines, though the Jetstar, an early business jet, had four. Advances in engine efficiency and power have rendered four-engine designs obsolete, and only Dassault Aviation still builds three-engine models (in the Falcon line). The emerging market for so-called "very light jets" and "personal jets" has seen the introduction (at least on paper) of several single-engine designs as well.

Airliners are sometimes converted into luxury business jets. Such converted aircraft are often used by celebrities with a large entourage or press corps, or by sports teams, but airliners often face operational restrictions based on runway length or local noise restrictions.

A focus of development is at the low end of the market with small models, many far cheaper than existing business jets. Many of these fall into the very light jet (VLJ) category. Cessna is developing the Mustang, a six-place twinjet (2 crew + 4 passengers) planned to be available for $2.55 million USD at the end of 2006. A number of smaller manufacturers have planned even cheaper jets; the first is the Eclipse 500 which has become available at around 1.5 million USD. It remains to be seen whether the new jet manufacturers will complete their designs, or find the market required to sell their jets at the low prices planned.

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Bombardier Global 5000 business jet takes off

There are approximately 11,000 business jets in the worldwide fleet with the vast majority of them based in the United States or owned by US companies. The European market is the next largest, with growing activity in Asia and Central America. There is a pre-owned marketplace in which aircraft are bought and sold based on their immediate deliverability because new aircraft orders often take two to three years for delivery.

Since 1996 the term "fractional jet" has been used in connection with business aircraft owned by a consortium of companies. Costly overheads such as flight crew, hangarage and maintenance can be shared through such arrangements.

Classes

The business jet industry groups the jets into five loosely-defined "classes", Heavy, Super Mid-size, Mid-size, Light, and Very Light^{[citation needed]}.

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Private Boeing 737-800 lands at London Luton Airport, England

Image:Cessna 525 citationjet g-sfcj arp.jpg

Cessna 525 CitationJet