Wraight’s electric ambitions for air cargo
Stan Wraight is showing no sign of slowing down. While many of his peers are enjoying retirement, the industry veteran keeps embarking on new ventures with a view to shaking the industry out of ossified concepts and practices.
After a long spell with KLM Cargo, he held senior positions at Atlas Air and AirBridgeCargo Airlines before striking out on his own in 2005 with consultancy Strategic Aviation Solutions International, which morphed into SASI World as it grew and added new facets to its portfolio while recruiting experienced industry figures to its line-up.
Wraight's latest venture, announced last November, is the formation of e-Smart Avia, a cargo airline with a difference. Set to take off in 2027 with a fleet of five electric ALIA CTOL aircraft, the venture sets out to add a new dimension to the air cargo industry.
Wraight describes BETA Technologies' ALI aircraft with its payload capability of 560 kilos and 5.6 cu m cabin space as a game changer. With a range of 500 km, it is perfectly suited for a next-day or express service, he says, adding that this comes at a fraction of the cost of using a regional cargo plane.
"The plane is perfect for cargo. It's simple and cost-effective. To carry a full payload over 249 nautical miles, the charging cost is between $17 and $30 per hour. The fuel on a Cessna on the same route is about $700."
Stan Wraight, President and CEO, SASI World
Cargo can be loaded in bulk or using small composite pallets. The aircraft can land on any hard surface and faces no constraints with airport operations – unlike drones, he points out.
"You won't get permission to operate drones everywhere. There is no cross-border operation permitted. An EVTOL is the way to go. It can be autonomous, but it is piloted," he says. "Piloted with capability for autonomous operation is the way to do it."
Business case outline
The deployment of an electric cargo plane offers a host of business cases, Wraight points out. E-Smart Avia intends to place its aircraft at strategic hubs to connect with long-haul flights to move urgent shipments like healthcare or AOG traffic.
"With an EVTOL, we can take cargo arriving at the airport, do customs clearance and deliver within a couple of hours, close to the cost of a truck, but we're avoiding road congestion. You can sell a next-day product, for example, for an aircraft engine going to Toulouse. Now you would fly that to Liege or Paris and put it on a truck. That's a two-day service. Instead, you put it on an EVTOL."
Stan Wraight, President and CEO, SASI World
Down the road, he envisages a growing role for electric cargo aircraft. As EVTOL development advances to larger models with greater payload capabilities, they can transform road feeder service by adding a faster 'air feeder service' option to the mix, he predicts. This will come close to trucking costs, but at a much faster speed.
The establishment of e-Smart Avia marks a new chapter in a venture that Wraight started in partnership with Jaques Heeremans, chief executive and founder of IAS Inter Aviation Services, and Denis Ilin, former chief executive of AirBridgeCargo, who heads the e-Smart Logistics brand.
It was set up to "provide clients with an end-to-end logistics capability from a single source, overcoming long-standing inefficiencies in the global airfreight ecosystem".
The thrust of the e-Smart Logistics venture has been the founders' 'virtual integrator' concept that spans air transport, technology, ground operations and digital communication systems.
Beta Technologies all-electric ALIA CTOL aircraft. Image: © Beta Technologies
Business model pressures
Airlines face pressures to alter their business model, Wraight argues. Their traditional distribution channel – the forwarders – is shrinking through consolidation, while the emerging behemoths and large e-commerce players control their dedicated freighter fleets.
To appeal to beneficial cargo owners, airlines must extend their reach beyond airport-to-airport services to end-to-end capabilities, he says.
In his eyes, these developments are not a threat to airlines but a possibility to raise their margins significantly.
By offering an end-to-end service, airlines can turn the tables on the integrators and compete with them for high-yield express traffic, as the express carriers' concept centred on a hub-and-spoke structure cannot match the speed of direct point-to-point flights, he reasons.
The cocktail of speed and end-to-end solutions has been largely associated with the e-commerce sector, but regulatory moves to stem the parcel tsunami are shifting at least part of this traffic to alternative solutions, which has raised question marks over the future alignment of airfreight with online shopping.
Wraight argues that the focus on B2C parcel traffic misses the point.
"E-commerce is not about de minimis. It's an avenue for a retailer to sell a product, and it's not only for retailers. It's also used in B2B. E-commerce is about getting what you want faster, cheaper and more efficiently."
Stan Wraight, President and CEO, SASI World
He points to Lufthansa Cargo's heyworld venture and the Courier Express offering of Emirates SkyCargo, which offer door-to-door services. The healthcare industry is the biggest customer base for the latter's offering, he notes.
The margins look promising. Cargo owners and online commerce platforms are not going to haggle over prices per kilo in the old-fashioned air cargo mindset.
"In those business cases, the air portion is considered an expense to be handled, as the money and margin is in the total logistics chain on the ground, not in the flown portion," he remarks.
Tech partnerships
Moreover, the service has to include customs clearance and enable the data flow between the involved parties. To that end, e-Smart Logistics has teamed up with Kale Logistics. According to Wraight, this gives customers a plug-and-play solution.
Kale's system can handle "with complete transparency any duty", which the exporter can pay and include in the price, he says.
Again, this goes beyond B2C commerce, he stresses.
"You can use the same technology for any high-level vertical. It's all about speed at 48 or 72 hours, transparency and door-to-door at piece level," he says.
SASI World has spent a lot of time working with airports to address obstacles to better cargo flow, which led to the evolution of its 'Smart Cargo Airports' programme.
One focal point of this is the aspect of data flow and the importance of a platform that allows all stakeholders to monitor shipments and take corrective action when necessary.
The three elements – Smart Cargo Airports, e-Smart Logistics and e-Smart Avia – can work together, according to Wraight.
"We can offer a complete service to an airline," he says. "We can do it for you, but we can also tell you how to do it yourself."
US-based Beta Technologies expects to get certification of its aircraft from the Federal Aviation Administration in the latter half of this year.
As an early adopter, e-Smart Avia expects to commence operations early next year. Wraight does not expect any delays in deliveries.
The fledgling airline will start with five aircraft. It holds options on 15 more.
The new venture is getting traction among a diverse client base that includes airlines as well as a postal agency and a national health service, but none of this is ready for public disclosure. Wraight expects this to happen when agreements move to the proof-of-concept stage.
"Data integration with airlines' IT departments will take time, then we can do proof of concept," he says.
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