About Pilot-Next
Built by a pilot, for pilots — because managing a shared aircraft shouldn't be a full-time job.
The Founder
My name is Chris van Eijk. I'm Dutch, based in The Hague, and I've been flying since 1999. In 2010 I became a shared aircraft owner — and immediately ran into the same problem every partnership faces: the admin overhead. Scheduling conflicts, cost splits, invoicing, maintenance tracking. All of it done in spreadsheets and group chats.
I've spent many years working as a developer and now run Now-Next, where I lead large-scale digital transformation programmes for multinationals. But my first love has always been aviation — and the problem of shared aircraft management never stopped bothering me.
The Origin Story
Back in 2010, no suitable tooling existed for managing shared aircraft costs and scheduling — and we also wanted to rent our plane out to other pilots. So I built my own web app: YouFly. The focus was always on minimising admin and maximising automation. It was state-of-the-art for its time, and over 15 years of running it I learned an enormous amount about what pilots and clubs actually need.
Technology moves on. YouFly was built on legacy foundations, and by the mid-2020s it was clear that a ground-up rewrite was the right call. That's how Pilot-Next was born — “next generation” in every sense. The same 15 years of hard-won operational insight, rebuilt on modern technology: React, NestJS, PostgreSQL, real-time sync, and a clean mobile-first UI.
Other tools have appeared in the meantime. Most of them try to do too much. Pilot-Next takes the opposite approach: the minimal set of features required to run a smooth operation. The more unnecessary detail you add to an app, the more you have to administer. We focus on simplicity, efficiency, and flexibility — 2-click booking, simple settlement, self-invoicing. Everything you need; nothing you don't.
The Company
Pilot-Next is a product of Now-Next, based in Voorburg, Netherlands. Now-Next specialises in digital transformation and builds products that solve real operational problems — Pilot-Next being the one closest to my heart.