Grujic Buys Air Pink's Planes for €14.6 Million

Businessman Branislav Grujic paid at least 1,714,776,000 dinars, about 14.6 million euros, for the airline Imperialjet, once Zeljko Mitrovic’s Air Pink. The change of ownership was officially registered on August 18, 2026, according to data from the Serbian Business Registers Agency, nearly ten months after the company entered bankruptcy.

According to the Agency for Licensing Bankruptcy Administrators, the 14.6 million euro figure was the appraised value of the company’s assets and, under standard procedure, the starting price of the bankruptcy sale. The final sale price was never disclosed, which means the known figure is really the floor of what Grujic actually paid.

Who Is the Buyer on Paper

The buyer on paper is a company called PF Aviation, whose main line of business is leasing and renting out air transport equipment. PF Aviation is formally owned by the Cypriot company Merlako Holding Limited, but the register of beneficial owners lists Grujic himself as the sole, 100 percent owner. On the same day ownership changed hands, the company also moved its registered address, from the Enjub Shopping Center in Belgrade’s Block 45 to Visnjiceva Street in the Stari Grad (Old Town) municipality, where several of Grujic’s other companies are also based.

What’s in the Package, and Why the Planes Can’t Fly

Along with the company itself, Grujic also acquired its equipment: four Cessna 560XL aircraft, a Ford Galaxy Titanium 2.2 TDCI passenger car, a Mercedes Benz Sprinter 516 CDI minibus, three tractors, tools and spare parts.

A flying permit is not part of the package. Air Pink lost its AOC certificate in early 2024, after the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) opened an investigation that January into Serbian private airlines. Investigators suspected that Air Pink and Air Emeralds, both linked to Mitrovic, along with Star Fly Wings, owned by Nikola Petrovic, described as a kum (a family tie akin to godfather status) of President Aleksandar Vucic, had falsified flight hours, flown Russian oligarchs close to Vladimir Putin, and skipped required maintenance by reporting fewer flight hours than they had actually logged. Rather than face the investigation in Serbia, all three companies voluntarily handed their permits back to the Civil Aviation Directorate and were struck from the list of licensed operators.

Mitrovic briefly confirmed the deregistration at the time. “It was done at our request,” one of Air Pink’s owners told the daily Danas.

Who Was Behind the Company Before Bankruptcy

When the scandal broke in early 2024, Mitrovic held 48 percent of Air Pink, Pink Media Group held 2 percent, and Aleksandar Ilic held the rest. In July 2024, when the company was renamed Imperialjet, the ownership structure changed: the Cypriot firm Icron Investments Limited took over the largest stake, at 58 percent, Ilic’s share was cut to 32 percent, and the German company Imperialjet Europe GmbH was registered as a co-owner. Mitrovic was removed from the list of official owners at that point.

The register of beneficial owners behind the Cypriot firm showed Ilic with 32 percent, Abed El Jauni with 36.99 percent, and Vladimir Petkovic with 27 percent, who at the time was also a director at no fewer than four of Mitrovic’s other companies.

Neither the name change nor the change of ownership helped the company consolidate financially. Bankruptcy proceedings were proposed on October 18, 2025, by AIK Bank, to which Imperialjet owed more than 12 million euros. Between 2016 and 2019, Air Pink had taken out nine loans in euros and dollars worth about 36 million euros combined: on the dollar side, two loans from 2016 of $924,649 and $1,160,812, and on the euro side, 339,266 euros in 2018 and 1,781,542 euros in 2019. By the end of 2023, the remaining debt stood at about 1.22 billion dinars (just over 10 million euros), and in that year alone the company had to repay about 3.8 million euros.

Who Is Branislav Grujic

Grujic has at least 26 companies in Serbia, spanning everything from residential construction and car dealerships to pharmaceuticals, consulting and security. He graduated from the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering in Belgrade, continued his studies in Karlsruhe, Germany, and was one of the youngest teaching assistants in theoretical mechanics at the University of Belgrade. He is a member of the Privrednik Serbian Business Club.

He is best known for Railway City Belgrade, a residential and commercial complex above Prokop railway station, which he is building as a 50/50 partner with Russian businessman Arkady Zelmanovich Blank. In a rare 2013 interview, Grujic spoke about the price of business success:

I can’t say I have a better quality of life. I was much happier when I was a teaching assistant and had more time for friends and sports. That’s how business works: I’d pay one dinar to get into the game, and two to get out of it.

There is no record of Grujic having previously owned an airline, even though PF Aviation’s stated line of business is precisely the leasing and rental of air transport equipment. Grujic has not responded to questions about the final sale price or about whether he plans to seek new flying permits.