Europeans' concerns about the embarrassment of having an aircraft ownership position on a public balance sheet is a non-issue, says NetJets chairman and CEO Richard Santulli.

"We'll just lease you a share," he told Show News here when asked about the decision by Bombardier to replace its Flexjet Europe program with the new Jet Membership charter initiative.

"They never had a fractional program here," Santulli said. As for the Jet Membership scheme, "When you retreat you're going to have to position somewhere."

Santulli, for his part, says he sent in reinforcements when he didn't like his European results. Before appointing Mark Booth as NetJets Europe co-chairman in September, the company tried to run the program from the U.S. "We didn't have an on-site CEO. That was a mistake I made," Santulli said.

As for 2002? "This will be our best year by probably three-fold."