AIRCRAFT-PARTS reseller Avatar Alliance, formed earlier this year to acquire the Delta Air Lines surplus-parts inventory, is restructuring to offer logistics services to new low-cost airlines.

Avatar says that it plans a full set of services, from parts sales through to spares provisioning and management, potentially offering start-up carriers a complete third-party spare package.

While Avatar will continue to acquire and sell parts, it is talking to airlines interested in using a third party for just-in-time deliveries to maintenance centres and urgent aircraft-on-ground parts service.

"Some new airlines may not want to make any investment at all in spares" says, chairman William Gardner. New US regulations making it more difficult to transfer components among airlines and third-party resellers will require more-expensive inventory-management systems, the company says, emphasising that its procedures meet the new requirements.

The Atlanta, Georgia-based firm was created in mid-1995 by financial, asset-management and technical organisations to acquire and remarket the Delta spares inventory, valued at $400 million (Flight International, 5-11 July). One of the founders, Inter-trade, is to withdraw, to focus on avionics and rotable components distribution.

Source: Flight International