Jeppesen Archives - JulietBravoFox Media

Integrating the pilot, the plane, and their phone in a singular ecosystem.

There’s a common thread here. Each one helps add context and fluency to our daily flight ops, whether we fly for ourselves, professionally, or in pursuit of opportunity.

Making sense of all the data we carry in our pocket or purse (or just being able to find it when we need it, at the moment we need it)….this has been the holy grail, elusive to grasp even as we power up the devices we have access to.

Any aircraft owner or pilot flying a high performance airplane in the IFR system knows the intersection of documentation both operational and procedural. Tying all of it together has felt like pushing a boulder up a mountain—from planning the flight and ensuring the aircraft is ready (and legal) to executing a flight plan through the clouds, to recording it faithfully at the end (and getting credit for those approaches logged) and making appointments for the next inspections.

With the sequential release of Garmin’s Smart Charts and ForeFlight’s Dynamic Procedures, depending on which app you use in your planning and as a backup on the flight deck, you can now use the power of the database (Garmin proprietary for Smart Charts or Jeppesen for ForeFlight) to carve out the plan you expect, and then be able to change it on the fly—and only present the data (from NOTAMs to fixes and altitudes) relevant to the approach you plan to fly. Or the one ATC switches you over to (or you choose based on changing conditions).

You can then follow along as your blue ownship toodles through the course on your smart phone or tablet. Briefly. While flying the airplane IRL.

ForeFlight’s Dynamic Procedures reduces the info on the display (here shown on the iPad) and uses a unique sidebar to distill the information and put it into context. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

On the aircraft side, two recent updates to the airplane management app world continue to drive critical information into your device, and connect you remotely to your airplane, should you be lucky enough to own one of the new ones. The enabling technology underneath both the Cirrus IQ app and the Daher Me & My TBM (now in a Kodiak version) is Garmin’s GDL 60 datalink unit installed in the airplane.

It needs a connection in order to “go live” so, as it was mentioned in Daher’s press conference today, you need to make sure you park your TBM 960 or Kodiak 900 in a pot with LTE 4G service. Hopefully your hangar has this capability, to start with.

If so, you can wake up the airplane remotely, and find out the fuel, TKS, oxygen, and database status on your phone…before you call the FBO to truck you over some avgas or Jet-A. Pretty amazing stuff.

Cirrus’ Todd Simmons talks about the connected nature of the Cirrus Experience at its press conference at Oshkosh 2025. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

Plus, you can stay connected with your friends in the type association, comparing notes on landing prowess and efficiency. If you want. Or you can just assess your own performance and take note accordingly the next time you meet up with an instructor. Other OEMs have similar programs in development, but it’s cool to see Cirrus and Daher leading the pack here in creating the ecosystem that can serve you up the data you need. When you need it.

Stay tuned for more connectivity news as EAA AirVenture 2025 continues….now with charging stations everywhere, appropriately.

Reflecting this week on the scrum to be the new Boeing CEO—or those distancing themselves from the fray—I’m reminded of one leader whose passing happened earlier this year, Horst Bergmann.

Bergmann was chairman and CEO of Jeppesen when I first joined the company from 1997 to 2000. A German Air Force navigator, he joined Jepp’s German division in 1963 after graduating from business school, rising to lead Jeppesen GmbH from 1977 to 1987, after which he was named president and CEO of the entire enterprise.

Horst Bergmann invested 40 years of his career in Jeppesen and its teams. [Credit: Boeing/Jeppesen]

Horst led with grace and the ability to listen, a trait noted by Mark Van Tine, a mentor and friend who was CEO of Jepp when I returned (a “boomerang” period from January 2012 to April 2014, when I led Aviation Training Solutions).

“Amazingly, I remember the exact moment I met Horst,” said Mark in an email to me. “On October 26, 1989, Jeppesen had just closed on the purchase of Lockheed DataPlan, Inc., and I was called up to the conference room in DataPlan’s Building 90 to have an ‘interview’ with Jim Terpstra [who retired in 2004 as SVP of Aviation Affairs] and Horst. The three of us talked for about 15 minutes (actually, as you might expect, Jim did most of the talking, and Horst and I just listened!).

“I still can vividly remember looking across the table at the German with big, bushy eyebrows and wondering about what was to come. That was the beginning of a relationship that truly had a profound impact on my life.”

Horst led Jepp through the first part of its transformation from a monopoly, a sole source of paper-based navigation into the digital world of integrated aviation services. During my first period there (1997-2000), Jepp had introduced Q service, and then JeppView charts on CD-ROM. Electronic flight bags had just stepped into the mainstream, and the FAA still wasn’t quite sure what to make of them. Oh, how far we’ve come!

Mike Pound, who served in Jeppesen’s corporate communications, also remembered learning more of Horst’s personal story. “After he retired, I knew him because we both were foundation board members, [and] we developed a warm relationship.

“I sat through several media interviews with him,” Pound continued, “and, as I learned his story, I was amazed. He grew up in post-WWII West Germany in a village that was decimated by the war. He then wound up at this company that had a contract with the Army Air Corps—Jeppesen GmbH—and when that contract expired, he went out and solicited commercial customers. Had he not succeeded, I don’t think Jeppesen would have become what it was. Awesome man.”

Early on in my first round at Jepp, I was invited to one of Horst’s “breakfast roundtables,” and I can still picture it. In fact, I learned an important lesson—he asked me, as a new employee, what surprised me after coming to work at Jepp. I said that as a pilot, I was surprised how few other pilots seemed to work there… you can image how that went over! Rightly so, he pointed out the many, many things that are important to a company like Jepp that tap into a huge range of other talents. My 28-year-old self was mortified—but I learned from it. Yes, there are roles where that background is required, but so many where other skills come first.

Horst retired in 2003—handing the reins over to Mark—just three years after Boeing purchased Jepp from Tribune, which had “flipped” the company after its purchase from Times Mirror.

As Boeing casts about for new leadership, I can’t help but be reminded of those effective leaders that challenged me while at the same time nurturing my growth. To a person, they had in common the ability to listen, to take in opposing viewpoints, and steer the outcome in a way that brought the team along with them. They have been deeply invested in that outcome, and not for personal gain but as part of a long-term strategy.

GE Aerospace’s Larry Culp has risen to the top as a natural candidate for Boeing’s chief, but I respect his stated desire to see through what he’s started as the OEM’s top supplier. As reported in Aviation Week, when asked if he would take the mantel as a service to the U.S.: “You know how important what we do underwing is to Boeing. So, GE Aerospace is important [to national security] too.” Bravo to you, Larry, for your desire to see through what you’ve invested in.

While an engineering background may not be an absolute requirement to lead Boeing (see the lesson above about pilots), an outsider selected for financial acumen only just feels like piling another bad decision on top of the whole mess.

Tag: Jeppesen

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