I recently got contacted by someone working for Conklin & de Decker, who informed me about the scholarship they will award to “a student who is officially enrolled in an aviation management program at a University Aviation Association (UAA) member school”. Applications have to be submitted before the 1st of August, so if you’re eligible, you’d better hurry up.

If your first reaction when your read Conklin & de Decker was in the “Who’s that ?” category, you’re not the first one. I frequently receive that kind of solicitation – companies looking for some exposure through this blog – and most of time I decline them, because I don’t want to want to run a permanent advertisment, but a (more or less) serious blog.

But here comes a company that will pay for one lucky student training, so I decided it was worth a look. I found out that apart from awarding pilot scholarships, Conklin & de Decker sells products and services to support aircraft operations.

Their products line comprises things like cost evaluator, performance comparator, life cycle costs calculator, maintenance manager, acquisition planner, and several others. Let me make another mind reading exercise… you think… “this is probably for jets and turboprops only”. That was an easy guess, it was also my idea. But no. The list of brands and models included in their tools also contains Cessnas, Pipers, Cirrus, and Diamond. But if you prefer getting data about a Boeing 747-SP, the also have it.

One and a half year ago, I envisaged to buy a plane. Not alone as I can’t afford it, but the idea was to create a new structure, kind of a “low-cost” flying club. It never became true because of other changes in my private life, but when I stopped, I was in the data collection phase. That was a tricky thing to do, because owners groups are rather obscure, and flight schools are not always open to the idea of exposing all their costs and revenues.

Someone serious about buying an aircraft should certainly get the kind of information and / or services that Conklin & de Decker provide. All in all, a company that guide pilots in buying aircraft, and awards a scholarship to a student pilot is definetly worth a post… don’t you think so ?