Three airline pilots who set up a new business while grounded during lockdown are taking the next big step forwards with the support of the Global Scale-up programme from GC Business Growth Hub.

Ryan Moody, Lawrence Sullivan, and Carl Russell are all full time pilots who found themselves unable to fly in 2020 due to lockdown.

Having previously paid to use a pilot logbook service to track their flights, they decided to save money by building their own version, which has grown into Complete Aviation, the first UK app to offer a logbook with airline roster sharing, aviation weather and airport information in one place.

“I wasn’t flying, and I was told I was not going to be flying for a good two years,” said Ryan. “So, I decided that I’m not going to pay for the various apps. I would still want to have a logbook and I decided to try to create my own and then it just grew from there. I stopped paying for all the different apps and decided to just make one with everything. Everything in one place, so that’s where it all stemmed from.

“We were looking to create the product ourselves, so we came onto the journey without any idea about how to create an app. We’ve never started a business before. All our expertise is in flying. We have no expertise outside that. We just knew what product we wanted to have. We didn’t know the middle, the part to get to that endpoint.”

Luckily, Trafford-based Carl was aware of GC Business Growth Hub and approached them to ask for support. This led to them enrolling on the Global Scale-up Programme, which enables companies across Greater Manchester to rapidly expand into multiple markets by providing access to a set of global experts, the latest international growth tools, global market opportunities and an exclusive peer to peer network.

Complete Aviation

Complete Aviation have worked closely with Philip Blair, Senior Advisor at Global Scale-up and Ryan said: “Phil’s been brilliant working with us. We have had their help massively. We really appreciate that it is going to help, they’re constantly checking up on us and see how we’re progressing or if there’s anything else we need help with.

“And now we’ll be trying to get grants from Innovate UK – through the Growth Hub we’re building a relationship with them, which is something we hadn’t thought about doing. The Growth Hub is really opening up things which we wouldn’t have known about or had access to previously.”

The three founders have all taken part in various courses and programmes since starting with work with the Business Growth Hub, including the Pathway 2 Equity Programme as well as receiving advice on improving their website. They have plans to expand their reach to more airlines, to cabin crew and to trainee pilots.

Philip Blair, Senior Advisor at Global Scale-up Programme said: “Working with Ryan and the team at Complete Aviation is a great example of how we best work with businesses that want to grow internationally.

“We take the time to understand the business and work together to identify their biggest opportunities and challenges. We introduce techniques and support to make that growth happen. We also use our network of partners and relationships to introduce businesses to the right people at the right time.”
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