Piaggio Aerospace's extraordinary commissioners have set a January 30 deadline for bidders to submit final and binding offers for the purchase of the Italy-based airframer. The deadline, which the company said represents a rescheduling in the long-delayed process, follows a due diligence phase under which 13 potential bidders were permitted to review company data.

Officials handling bankruptcy proceedings for Piaggio had reopened the bidding process in May 2023 after a previous effort to finalize the sale of the company failed in 2022. The reopening of the process yielded 18 expressions of interest last June, and the field was narrowed in July for the acquisition of Piaggio Aero Industries and Piaggio Aviation, the two companies that operate collectively as Piaggio Aerospace.

Piaggio commissioners Carmelo Cosentino, Vincenzo Nicastro, and Gianpaolo Davide Rossetti had characterized the bidders as “first-level companies or consortia mainly with an industrial background, with an interest in buying the company in its entirety and mostly based in Italy or Europe.”

Originally, the commissioners had planned to ask for binding offers following the due diligence period in August.

In response to increasing interest in carbon mitigation from its customers, Textron Aviation is set to debut a new sustainability program for owners of Cessna, Beechcraft, and Hawker aircraft.

Part of the Wichita-based airframer’s ProAdvantage suite of products, the new SustainableAdvantage offering was developed in partnership with industry sustainability solutions provider 4Air to provide aircraft owners with an additional option for reducing their carbon emissions footprint. The program will offer users the ability to offset their carbon emissions to 4Air’s Bronze (carbon neutral) tier.

For its role in the program, which launches in January, 4Air will manage a portfolio of verified carbon reduction projects around the world. Based on those, it will offer carbon offsets that can be used against the emissions from operating aircraft. For those aircraft owners who choose to join the SustainableAdvantage program, 4Air will provide personalized annual reports documenting their offset purchases and will also offer monitoring and compliance reporting requirements for ESG initiatives, such as the Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation (CORSIA) and the EU’s Emissions Trading System (ETS).

“Our relationship with Textron Aviation acknowledges the many strides we have made in the industry to make sustainability more accessible,” said 4Air COO Nancy Bsales. “We are excited to provide Cessna, Beechcraft, and Hawker owners with sustainable options that address and meet their environmental commitments and goals.”

Online charter broker KinectAir has unveiled a new AI-powered empty leg marketplace, where operators can list their repositioning flights that would otherwise go unoccupied, making it easier for potential customers to review and access them.

The system allows users to view a variety of options from many charter providers and, according to the company, the AI-backed software—which searches empty legs from different operators—does away with time-consuming blind searches. In the system’s interface, users can easily link two separate empty legs to create a round trip, taking an outbound flight from one operator and selecting a return from a separate operator’s schedule. The marketplace also allows them to set notification alerts for desired route availability.

“The way KinectAir manages repositioning flights is an industry-first, bridging the gap between private air travel and affordability and signaling a shift in how we perceive and access destination flying,” explained company co-CEO and co-founder Ben Howard. ‘This is the ultimate tool for flexible and spontaneous travelers, truly democratizing private flights, making them as accessible as booking a car, and as affordable as commercial air travel.”

Reliable Robotics has flown a small cargo airplane with no humans on board for the first time, marking a significant milestone for autonomous aviation. The uncrewed flight test, which Reliable Robotics announced on December 6, took place at Hollister Municipal Airport in California on the morning of November 21.

The company’s modified Cessna 208B Caravan safely executed a 12-minute test flight—including taxi, takeoff, and landing—without any human intervention, although the aircraft was monitored by a remote pilot at a control station about 50 miles (80 kilometers) from the airport in Mountain View. A 360-degree camera inside the cockpit recorded a video of the flight, which Reliable Robotics released on YouTube.

Company CEO Robert Rose told AIN that the FAA granted Reliable Robotics a special airworthiness certificate permitting it to fly the experimental uncrewed aerial system (UAS) for research and development purposes with some limitations. The company was required to file a notice to air missions (notam) and fly within a specified boundary that was within the visual line of sight (VLOS) of observers on the ground.

Reliable Robotics is developing its autonomous flight control system with the ultimate goal of enabling uncrewed cargo flights. The first iteration of this technology that the company plans to commercialize will be an advanced autopilot system for single-pilot operations in crewed aircraft, which is meant to supplement rather than replace onboard pilots.

In a possible precursor to budget cuts, the Los Angeles controller has released an audit critical of that city’s police department Air Support Division (ASD), including its size, costs, and patrol model. But city controller Kenneth Mejia, a former Green Party member and thrice-failed congressional candidate, expanded the audit beyond purely financial issues to attack the ASD on environmental and social grounds, claiming that the ASD causes “significant harm to the community.”

The audit criticized the ASD for flying 61 percent of its 16,000 annual hours on activities not related to violent crime, keeping imprecise logs, its 762,000-gallon annual jet-A fuel burn and resultant carbon dioxide emissions, flying too often over high crime areas, noise pollution, not flying high enough (typically flying at 500 to 700 feet agl), and overall effectiveness.

“There is a lack of empirical evidence that demonstrates a clear link between helicopter patrols and crime reduction. However, there has been limited public discussion about whether the size of the division and deployment strategy are aligned with the current needs of the city,” the audit noted.

The ASD’s budget was on par with entire city agencies, including Community Investment for Families and Animal Services. The budget is also larger than other agencies, such as Cultural Affairs; Civil + Human Rights and Equity; and Cannabis Regulation.

AIN’s FBO survey is open for year-round feedback, but the deadline to vote in the 2024 survey (to be published in April) is February 3. The survey takes only a minute, and you can do it while waiting for passengers, on the shuttle bus to/from the hotel, or any other time that is convenient for you. Participants will be entered to win a $500 Amazon gift card. Log in to rate your experiences at the FBOs you visit. The AIN 2024 FBO Survey promotion is sponsored by AEG FUELS.