AVIAA, the international group purchasing organization for business aviation, is adding over 150 new aircraft to their membership with the announcement today (28th January) it has reached an agreement with Europe's smart purchasing business Convolus to merge their operations.

The move will see AVIAA widen its footprint in Europe with the establishment of an office in Munich, Germany, complementing its existing bases in the UK and US. Irena Deville, co-founder and CEO of Convolus, becomes Managing Director - Europe and Middle East for AVIAA, and she will work alongside California-based CEO Gillian Hayes and her team.

"We are delighted to have formalized this agreement with Convolus. It marks a significant strategic step for AVIAA, which will enable us to deliver larger scale global purchasing for our collective members and suppliers," said AVIAA CEO Gillian Hayes.

Speaking at Corporate Jet Investor's annual 2019 conference in London she highlighted how the deal will help the business grow and enable AVIAA to deliver value for members and its supply network in new geographies, and bring expanded procurement services to new European members.

After the acquisition formally concludes this month, the AVIAA community will support a member fleet of nearly 500 aircraft and a network of suppliers with global operations across every spend category, including a robust international FBO network.

Existing Convolus members will be seamlessly integrated into the AVIAA community. In addition to the increased buying power the fleet merger will afford them, they will also be able to accrue further cost savings in the AVIAA supply chain, which covers expanded service categories, including insurance, maintenance, fuel, business operations, and crew training.

AVIAA's predominately US-based members will be able to draw benefits and savings from the enlarged group's 100-strong European FBO network, from large multi-destination handlers to stand-alone individual FBOs.

"Business aviation in Europe remains significantly fragmented," commented Irena Deville. "The opportunity to scale up and expand with AVIAA means we can optimize our technology solutions; combine our procurement data sets globally to better inform pricing, predict spend, and streamline our transactions. It all comes down to better serving our members and suppliers as we add new categories to support our mainstay pillars." she added.

Irena brings a wealth of experience to AVIAA, not just for her insight and embracing of disruption as co-founder of London-based Convolus, but in her former role focused on mergers and acquisitions activity and spearheading consolidation efforts.

Prior to developing Convolus, Irena was Head of Strategic Development at Gama Aviation Plc, where she was responsible for implementing the group's strategic development and acquisition strategy.

Irena joins a team at AVIAA with deep experience not only in aviation, but insurance and risk management, technology, marketing, and group purchasing. AVIAA uses aggregation, transparency, industry expertise, and proprietary algorithms to streamline the procurement process for both operators and vendors. Through membership, operators of all sizes achieve improved business intelligence and economies of scale, allowing them to get the best value for key operational items; suppliers receive committed volume without the overhead, reduced friction costs around transactions, and deep insights into customer behavior and purchasing patterns.

Contributed by AVIAA