Mike Pero spreads his wings and takes flight

Mike Pero has left mortgages behind to manufacture flight simulators for pilot training and recreation, and to carry air freight. Picture / Simon Baker

He used to roll up his sleeves and work in his parents' fish-and-chip shop, but now Mike Pero is reaching for the skies.

The founder of Mike Pero Mortgages is launching two new ventures: one to carry air freight, the other to train pilots and entertain aviation junkies.

The idea of showing people how to fly one of the world's most popular aircraft, a Boeing 737, excites Pero.

That's why he has created Pacific Simulators International, which makes flight simulators, and Flight Experience, which offers the public the chance to feel what it's like to take a large passenger aircraft for a spin.

Pero says he is spending most of his time on this business, which he hopes to soon take overseas.

"We've made a replica of a Boeing 737 flight deck, so it's a very authentic flight experience and we're the only people in the world doing this," said the award-winning businessman, who is known for his promotion and marketing skills.

From a Christchurch factory, Pero has staff making the mock cockpits to satisfy those curious about what goes on at the pointy end of an aeroplane. The flight simulators are Civil Aviation Authority-certified.

Simulators are already in place at the Northlands shopping mall at Papanui in Christchurch, Courtney Central in downtown Wellington and Bay Flight International in Tauranga.

By October 20, Pero expects Auckland's first Pacific Simulator to be installed at Botany Town Centre. A simulator is also planned to open in Queenstown in the next two weeks.

Now that Pero has ditched his attempt to buy the profitable freight arm of failed domestic airline Origin Pacific, he has announced a new interest: starting up a regional freight company, Pacific Express Airfreight.

He sees a big gap in the market but is yet to announce further details.

Pero grew up in Aranui in Christchurch. His father, Tom, is of Cook Islands heritage and mother Angela of Scottish stock. The family owned fish-and-chip shops where Pero worked as a kid and he boasts he can still cook a mean seafood fillet.

He left Shirley Boys High at 16 after passing some school certificate subjects. His academic achievements were "very average", he says.

But the adrenalin junkie had a powerful ambition and he credits early sports successes with instilling a driving ambition. He tested his courage on the race track and in the air. He learned to fly and he raced motorbikes.

At 17, he won the first of six national motorcycle road racing awards. During the 1970s, he had his first entrepreneurial experiences marketing himself as a motorbike racer to sponsors.

He gained a commercial pilot's licence and, in 1988, founded a new airline, Air Link. He flew for Mount Cook Airlines and then branched into finance. In 1990, he founded Mike Pero Mortgages, now the country's largest mortgage broker with 45 franchises.

In 1999 his Mike Pero Mortgages won the Pacific Business of the Year award. In 2003, Pero was named Pacific Business Person of the Year.

He is a consultant to Mike Pero Mortgages, which he sold out of for $15 million. The mortgage broker is about to be privatised and vanish from the NZX, after being bought by NZ Finance and Australia's Liberty.

In 2004, Pero bought a 25 per cent stake in regional airline Origin Pacific and became a director, although he later resigned this position and says he has now lost interest in any rescue bid.

Last month, he said he had lost more than $3 million investing in the Nelson-based commuter airline and freight forwarder.

Despite his obvious wealth, Pero has not appeared on the NBR Rich List for some years.

"That's because I keep having marriage problems - I've been married twice," he said, mentioning that his new partner, Rachael, is manager of Flight Experience in Christchurch.

Pero's four children are Melanie, in her early 20s, Aaron, 20, Courtenay, 11 and Rachael, 7. The younger children live in Christchurch and he says he sees them regularly. He has bought a property at the peaceful Lake Brunner on the West Coast where he hopes to build a bush retreat.

"Lake Brunner is one of the best-kept secrets in New Zealand because the lake is warm and surrounded by rainforest so it's just so natural and yet no one seems to know about it."

Flight Experience's marketing promises clients they will be strapped into the captain's seat and under the guidance of a qualified flight simulator instructor will follow the airline checklist procedures through all phases of a real commercial flight.

Pero is so enthusiastic about the new technology that he reckons he could teach a 12-year-old to fly.

"It's not that hard, it's only direction and altitude," he explains, after winning an award at the Canterbury Business Awards on Thursday night.

Flight experiences start from $90 but for $200 people can be taught to fly a Boeing from Wellington to Auckland.

The new simulators are worth around $600,000 each, considerably less than the $20 million for motion simulators, equipment widely used in this sector. Pero hopes to sell at least 20 simulators in the next few months.

"Our charge of $200 an hour is about 20 per cent of the cost of a full motion simulator," he said.

As for the terrorism risks involved in training pilots, Pero says he often gets cracks about the possibility of extremists using the new technology.

"I'm used to those jokes now and even the Immigration Department had concerns that we could be training terrorists. But it's just like guns or cars that can kill people - you don't stop teaching people how to drive a car just because cars kill people."

After the interview, Pero sent this email, partly in response to what he considered an aggressive line of questioning about his personal life: "I enjoyed talking to you. You should consider a career in journalism. If that fails maybe a career in the police."

Mike Pero

Entrepreneur, founder of the country's largest mortgage broking business.

* Age: 46.

* Education: Shirley Boys High, Christchurch.

* Family: Married twice, divorced, has four children.

* Lives in: Christchurch.

* Heritage: Part-Rarotongan, named Pacific Business Person of the Year in 2003.

* New ventures: air freight and flight simulation.

* Chief executive officer, Flight Experience, Pacific Simulators.