Novartis flies a Falcon 7X from New York back to Basel as drug-price backlash simmers

Novartis flew one of its Dassault Falcon 7X jets, tail number HB-JFQ, from Greenwood Lake Seaplane Base in New Jersey to its home base at EuroAirport Basel–Mulhouse–Freiburg on June 7, 2026. The six-hour, 37-minute transatlantic crossing touched down in Basel just before 9:38 a.m., following an earlier round trip from Basel to the New York area on May 28.

The trip coincides with an ongoing reputational dustup over Novartis corporate aviation. In April, the pharmaceutical giant confirmed it had added a new Dassault Falcon 8X to its fleet, a $60 million aircraft, per a report from ch-aviation. That same month, Pravda Switzerland noted that critics — including Swiss Social Democrat Samuel Bendahan — had seized on the purchase as tone-deaf while Swiss families struggle with rising health insurance premiums and Novartis pushes for higher drug prices. The company’s press office offered only a brief statement: “We confirm that we have replaced a private jet used for business purposes.”

Novartis already operates three Falcon 7X jets — including HB-JFQ — plus a Eurocopter EC135 from its dedicated 40,000-square-foot aviation facility at Basel. For a firm that shuttles executives to research centers, regulatory meetings, and manufacturing sites across Europe and North America, the May 28 New York swing and today’s return suggest routine business traffic — but as the Falcon 8X controversy lingers, every flight arrives in an atmosphere where optics, not just logistics, matter.