Clive Jackson Chief Executive, Fly Victor

Interviewed by Vincent Abrams

I’m inspired by anything to do with communication, connectivity and making people’s lives easier. I’m constantly looking for opportunities to do things differently and, most importantly, more effciently.

These areas are particularly where consumers need to interact with brands and businesses, and also where consumers interact between themselves to create and add value for each other, which in turn benefts the businesses that serve them.

I’m motivated by fnding ways of cutting down on duplicate information. Travel and trip management services such as Tripit and WorldMate together with Hilton’s “digital key app” called Hilton HHonors, which began beta testing late last year and allows you to check-in and select your room the day before you arrive, are prime examples of where technology can improve the customer experience and reduce the amount of wasted time.

How did you get into the private jet (aviation) business?

Having spent a lifetime involved directly in and also servicing the travel, hotel and leisure industries, I have come full circle back to the world of aviation; albeit, in this instance with Victor, amongst private and business jets.

When I spotted an opportunity in the world of private aviation in 2010, combining my travel and technology experiences, I started writing the business plan for Victor.

What are you working on right now? I.e. expansion, campaigns etc.

I’m currently working on driving the international expansion of Victor, which is one of the UK’s fastest growing technology companies, currently 15th on the Sunday Times Tech Track 100 list and last year expanded into the US.

Victor has really taken off with a consumer proposition that has struck a chord with the most discerning travel segment and caught the connectivity of everything at just the right moment. The business idea was born out of my frustration with the excessive fees and lack of transparency in the broker-driven private jet charter market.

As a second-home owner in Mallorca, I regularly travelled to and from London until BMI cancelled all scheduled services during the depth of the global recession.

Through word of mouth I gathered together 20 existing and aspiring private jet fyers, who helped me establish both the business principles and consumer benefts that formed the foundations of a new and exciting business plan.

Which travel apps do you feel are the most disruptive?

Disruption comes in various forms. I see disruption as a question of: ‘How can we streamline and cut out ineffciency and waste to create a more pleasurable experience?’

When I talk about disruption it means presenting new ways of doing things and intelligent interaction allows businesses to do this for the consumer, providing them with new ways to access and manage information.

With this in mind, great examples of disruptive travel apps are TripIt, Kayak and TripCase.

These three apps fall into a category where – as a traveller – my itineraries, hotel information and email-updates can be fed into the cloud, and my travel itinerary is constantly updated and fed back to me wherever I am, 24-7.

This is something that would be a nightmare for my travel manager or personal assistant, particularly when you are operating in a different time zone to your home or offce base.

Other examples of disruptive travel apps are WorldMate for the business traveller and TripAmatic for leisure.

TripIt, Kayak and WorldMate are probably the top three: TripIt: All you do is send the confrmation email from your travel agent or airline to plan@tripit.com and it optimises and displays your plans on the app.

Kayak: offers precisely the same thing that TripIt does: Send your booking confrmation email – or confrmation number – to Kayak and it will make your plans ‘magically’ ready.

WorldMate: introduces the concept of saving on hotel bookings and fight tickets through its app: This makes it easy for a frequent traveller to save a signifcant amount of money on routine fights and hotel reservations.

What business (or industry) did you work in before setting up Victor?

I served as a ground-handling, ticketing, reservations and check-in agent with British Airways, before striking out into the luxury tour segment and becoming the youngest general manager of an ABTA tour operator, operating at the very pinnacle of luxury travel with ITP Villa World.

In 1993, I started Global Beach, one of the very frst digital design and build agencies, servicing clients such as Unilever, Hewlett-Packard, Sony Entertainment and a plethora of travel and hotel groups.

We developed customer acquisition and retention strategies, website and booking portals and, of course, mobile apps (my frst ever mobile app was developed on the WAP technology platform for Jaguar Formula One in 2000).

Why did you decide to name the business ‘Victor’..?

We felt that the name needed to refect personality of customers who use the service.

CEOs of businesses who are discerning, time poor and want to control their lives by the minute and dictate the pace.

The attitude of our clients to both business and life is about wanting to win, being a ‘victor’. The Victor name works in 27 different languages around the world and also fts as ‘Victor’ is an aviation term, so it’s perfect in that sense.