Two companies are targeting the UK market for luxury air travel as their next stop.

Stellar Labs, a company that aims to be the Airbnb of the private jet market, and Global Jet Capital, a provider of financing solutions for private jets, will launch in the UK this year.

Stellar Labs offers an online market for private aviation, connecting private jet operators and owners, and those looking to charter business aircraft. The company launched in the US last year and within three months, 27 private jet owners and operators, who together represent around a fifth of the charter fleet in the US, signed up.

Following its launch in the UK private jet charter market, which it estimates to be worth £254 million ($363 million) a year – with around a third of business flights empty – Stellar Labs plans to “dramatically” increase the number of people flying privately. If owners could secure charter clients on these through increased demand, better fleet optimisation and airline-style revenue management, millions of pounds in fees could be generated, the company said.

“Our aim is to drag the sector into the digital age by offering it the first digital marketplace which properly connects owners and managers of private jet aircraft and fleets with potential clients who could charter them,” said Paul Touw, chief executive of Stellar Labs.

“Our proposition is the most effective solution in the private jet market for sourcing aircraft and seeing what is available, pricing it fairly and correctly, securing it and then paying to charter it. If you make things easier to buy and those selling and buying both benefit, you will grow the market.”

Global Jet Capital, which was launched in 2014, has $2.5 billion in assets under management with the additional capacity to lend $1 billion. For its UK launch, the company is looking to recruit a team to cover the country, which it states has the second largest fleet of business aircraft in Europe after Germany, and the rest of Europe.

The company highlighted that 14.8 per cent of the UK’s fleet of mid to large private jets is currently on the market for sale, with an estimated average cost of between $25 million and $75 million. Up to 80 per cent of the funding used to buy these is secured through external financing, it noted.

“The UK is an attractive market for us. It has one of the largest fleets of business aircraft in the world, at present a relatively high percentage up for sale,” said Shawn Vick, executive director of Global Jet Capital. “We have a large warehouse facility in place and are prepared to lend to clients wanting to purchase or lease mid to large private jets in the UK and elsewhere.”