One thing HOUR's, at the end of the two year period the instructor will have around 1500 hours. Before I entered this sponsorship I had a CPL completed on a full time course and thought that I knew everything about flying and wanted to be on a nice shiney jet. Now that I have completed my time as an instructor I realise how green I actually was, my flying is now spot on in all areas and because of the ground school that students require my knowledge is far beyond what it was at the end of the full time CPL (frozen ATPL) course.
I know that the airlines that utilise this sponsorship like the process because the FI f/o's generally sail through the sim training and line training with the experience that they have. F/o's taken from the integrated course have a greater drop out rate than the F/I equivelants to the point that Buzz is only sponsoring through this F/I scheme.
Now I don't want this to be an integrated vs. everyone else thread, the fact of the matter is good and bad pilots are produced on both routes, trust me though, after two years of students trying to kill you you are prepared for anything and the airlines recognise this. The general recruiting order is as follows:
1 - sponsored cadets (either FI or integrated)
2 - experienced type rated pilots
3 - experienced airline pilots
4= - Pilots with hours from GA
4= - Pilots straight out of flight school.
Let me ask you this question, why should a pilot straight off an integrated course with approx. 200 hours total time be employed ahead of an experienced F.I. with 1000 hours plus.