When meeting their new aircraft at the completion center in Little Rock, Falcon owners and operators are likely to spend time with Charles Grivotet, Manager of Aircraft Delivery and Cabin Support.
Charles is a great ambassador for Dassault Aviation. He wants to deliver a perfect airplane, but more than that, he wants flight crews (and passengers, as well) to have a thorough understanding and comfort level with the systems they’ll be using.
Well, of course pilots will be familiar with systems, you will say. That’s true of everything to the flight deck bulkhead. The increasingly sophisticated cabin systems may be something of a mystery, however, for pilots, flight attendants and new owners who are not well briefed.
Charles says pilots sometimes express concern about an onboard Internet failure, because it does not figure into any formal training program they receive. While it’s not a critical flight system, it may seem that way to passengers in the back.
Charles and his team are well aware of how important cabin communications systems have become. Senior executives, he says, simply expect to be able to communicate as they do in their office, or to stream Netflix programs as they do from home. And this is no small matter, as U.S. passengers often want to stream from Netflix U.S. no matter where in the world they are. (Yes, FalconConnect lets you make this selection).
So, among his many responsibilities, he makes sure new owners are well briefed on the cabin systems.
I don’t think you could find a bigger aviation enthusiast within Dassault than Charles and, of course, our company is full of aviation enthusiasts. Charles’ first commercial flight was at age five from Paris to New York, when his father was taking up a U.S. assignment with John Deere. As a teen back in France, Charles soloed in Orleans at 15 and became, for a while, the youngest private pilot in France when he earned his license on his 17th birthday (before he was legally allowed to drive at 18).
Charles earned an aerospace engineering degree from the prestigious ISAE-ENSMA school in Poitiers, followed by an internship at Dassault Falcon Jet, Little Rock and later dual aerospace engineering degree at Embry-Riddle in Daytona Beach, Florida.
Then it was back to Little Rock designing interior components for the 7X and other aircraft. Of course, he had to try them out in the air and he reports that he is one of the lucky few to take a shower at 40,000 feet on a Falcon 8X.
Charles found a lot to like in Little Rock, including his wife. They have a one-year old daughter, Madeline, pronounced like the heroine of the beloved Ludwig Bemelmans children’s books. And now he has applied for U.S. citizenship.
We are thrilled that passionate people like Charles are the outward face of Dassault Aviation. They are a vital link with customers. They are also an invaluable source of customer input back to program and design teams, which are always seeking input to improve the product.
Meanwhile, expect Charles and team to be rigorously inspecting the comfort and cabin communications features of the new Falcon 6X. And sharing all that knowledge to put Falcon customers at ease.
Senior Vice President, Worldwide Falcon Customer Service & Service Center Network
Dassault Aviation
