Emirates has secured the future of two Airbus A380s in its fleet after signing a five-year lease extension with DS Aviation, a subsidiary of Dr. Peters Group.
Under the terms of the extension announced in January 2025, Emirates has been given the option by Dr. Peters Group to purchase the Airbus A380s at the end of each extension period.
The leases are held by two open-ended investment funds, Flight Invest 50 and Flight Invest 51, that Dr. Peters Group acquired from Hannover Leasing at the end of 2021.
“Thanks to DS Aviation’s excellent contacts with Emirates, both parties reached an agreement in recent weeks to extend the lease agreements for the two aircraft in the Flight Invest 50 and 51 funds by five years each, until December 2030 and August 2031, respectively,” said a spokesperson for Dr. Peters Group.
The extension signals Emirates commitment to the A380 with the option to purchase meaning that the airline can continue to operate the superjumbo well into the next decade.
Dr. Peters Group also confirmed details surrounding an Airbus A380 previously operated by Singapore Airlines.
Just over a year and a half after the Dr. Peters Group acquired Flight Invest 49, investors decided to take back the aircraft, which the lessee had parked in Alice Springs, Australia, since the COVID-19 pandemic.
As part of the return, Singapore Airlines paid all outstanding lease payments due until the end of the lease agreement in late August 2025 in a single payment. The fund then sold the aircraft’s engines to Singapore Airlines.
The remaining aircraft parts were then sold to an Australian company at the end of 2025 following negotiations by DS Aviation.
“Thanks to the highly professional work of our experienced asset managers at DS Aviation, we have succeeded in achieving the best possible results for all three A380 funds that we acquired at the end of 2021. We are very pleased that, following Flight Invest 49, we will also achieve positive results for the investors of the Flight Invest 50 and 51 funds,” said Kristina Salamon, Managing Partner of the Dr. Peters Group.
As a result of the contract extension, investors in Flight Invest 50 received a payout of 16.8% in December 2025.
Investors in Flight Invest 51 received a payout of 15% in the summer of 2025 and a further payout of 12% was made in January 2026 in connection with the extension.
Investors in Flight Invest 49 are expected to achieve a total return of over 140%.