AeroJones, the newfacility in Taiwan that is producing Flight Design airplanes, has shipped its first order to the U.S., to Airtime Aviation in Tulsa, Oklahoma. “We are extremely pleased to get the first shipment from fully approved and certified producer, Taiwan-based AeroJones,”Flight Design USA President Tom Peghiny said at Sun ‘n Fun today. “We have not been able to get enough airplanes to meet demand for nearly two years. With this first delivery of two aircraft to Airtime Aviation, we are going to get things really rolling again in the USA.” Matthias Betsch, CEO of Flight Design in Germany, said today his company (which is separate and independent from Flight Design USA) is working to solve its financial problems and he hopes to have a plan in place by this summer.
Betsch said his company is now in receivership, which is a kind of “voluntary insolvency” that is “similar to but not exactly like” Chapter 11. The situation arose when an engineering customer failed to come through with expected payments. Betsch said he is working to either find new investors or to sell off assets, to rebalance the books and get the production line back up and running. The company remains completely capable of producing airplanes and is committed to the C4 project, he said. He said he will have a more detailed update later this year at EAA AirVenture.
Peghiny said he recently visited the AeroJones facility in Taiwan, and “the aircraft are Flight Design aircraft in all respects.” The materials, molds, processes and manuals are identical to those used to produce the existing worldwide fleet of CT series aircraft. “The conformity paperwork is approved by the Flight Design engineers and the final FAA 8130-15 Statement of Compliance is signed by Flight Design engineers,” he said. Chi-Tai Hsieh, the vice-executive-president for aviation at AeroJones, is visiting Sun ‘n Fun this week. “We are very proud to see our aircraft come to the biggest aviation market in the world,” he said at today’s news conference. He is looking forward “to meet with and learn from the U.S. dealers and customers,” and will be available at the Flight Design USA and AeroJones booth, located at MD-017B.
Peghiny also announced today that Flight Design USA has created its own solution for ADS-B Out installations, and is offering the system to U.S. owners of its aircraft. “We’ve had many requests for a recommended system from owners of our CTSW and earlier CTLS airplanes,” he said. John Hurst, the company’s CT avionics expert, designed a complete package from FreeFlight Systems that includes a WAAS GPS, an ADS-B antenna, an external GPS antenna, plus a wiring harness, circuit breaker and antenna cable. The package sells for $2,600 plus installation.
