The Faculty of Commerce and Administration is forming a partnership with IBM, the world's leading provider of information hardware, software and services to the aviation industry.

An agreement announced on Monday between the Faculty and the computer giant calls for IBM to supply instructors and experts in aviation and information technology to the Aviation Master's of Business Administration (AMBA).

IBM will also help Concordia export management training to other countries. About 60 students at Beijing University's Aerospace and Aeronautics Institute will likely be the first distance-education students in the AMBA.

However, some future students will come from IBM itself. The computer company's aviation and transport division comprises more than 2,500 people, 500 of them in Montreal, and IBM wants Concordia to give their personnel the latest in aviation management training.

Competition is intense among the world's airlines, partly as a result of deregulation and privatization, and there is a shortage of well-trained executives in the field, which the AMBA program is well poised to supply.

The AMBA is one of the Faculty's self-financing programs. Students pay $25,000 US for one year, and most are subsidized by their employers. Of the 24 current students, only two are from North America. The director of the program is Professor Dale Doreen.

IATA, the Montreal-based International Air Transport Association, was a partner in founding the six-year-old AMBA. About 300 international aviation executives were in Montreal for IATA's annual meeting on Monday and Tuesday, and the Concordia-IBM deal was a matter of lively interest there.

Concordia has been invited to join IBM's U.S.-based Advanced Business Institute in Electronic Commerce, and the Faculty will establish the International Centre in Aviation Management Education and Research.

According to this agreement, which could eventually extend beyond the aviation sector, IBM will make internships available to selected AMBA students. -BB