To paraphrase a famous American philosopher, predictions can be hard to make, especially when they’re about the future. But seeing the future of the entry-level business jet market 20 years ago, Cessna, with the creation of its seminal CitationJet, must have been watching the future in some late ’80s version of high definition. The airplane it created not only sold very well for a long time — Cessna has built 359 original CitationJets during the airplane’s run — but that entry-level jet also spawned several close derivatives. The company has produced 1,450 CJs in all. These airplanes have helped Cessna dominate the market for light, small-cabin jets up to the boundary of midsize.
In some cases Cessna’s competitors have tried, with limited success, to create an alternative vision of the light jet paradigm that Cessna seems to have both invented and perfected.
