The past several years have seen some pretty frosty sales reports from light airplane manufacturers. But in advance of yesterday’s General Aviation Manufacturers Association (GAMA) luncheon, Beechcraft, Cirrus and Piper reported that sales are heating up.
On the cusp of its ownership transition to Textron, Beech looked back fondly on its first year as an independent company. CEO Bill Boisture said, “It’s safe to call our first year as a standalone company a success.” He referred to the emergence from bankruptcy early last year, followed by deliveries of 205 general aviation aircraft, including 35 Barons and 35 Bonanzas. But the big story was the avalanche of King Air deliveries — 135 in all, up from a mere 46 in 2012. On the military side, Beech delivered 34 T-6 Texan II trainers to services around the world. Boisture also cited high sales bookings and substantive revenue from maintenance of Hawker and Beech aircraft — on both the civilian and military sides of the ledger.
