In a press conference Nov. 5, Cirrus President and CEO Brent Wouters said that the company will now make the Avidyne Entegra Release 9 integrated flight deck available on new SR20 and SR22 airplanes.
Previously, Cirrus discarded Avidyne panels in favor of Garmin’s Perspective avionics suite. Wouters said that because of recent customer interest, “dozens” of buyers may order the new Avidyne glass cockpit in the next six months. With anticipated deliveries of about 350 Cirrus aircraft next year, Wouters said that perhaps 10 percent of those will be fitted out with the new Entegra. The vast majority will continue to opt for Garmin’s Perspective, a panel based on Garmin’s very popular G1000 avionics suite.
In other comments, Wouters boasted of Cirrus’ recent financial successes, saying that Cirrus’ fixed costs are more than 50 percent lower than 12 months ago; that inventory has been reduced by 58 percent over a year ago; and that revenue per transaction is up 20 percent from those of last year.
As for the company’s SF50 Vision jet program, Wouters said that “Cirrus is spending less money on the Vision project, but we’re still making progress.” Though the staffing dedicated to the Vision has been reduced, several design elements have been frozen, Wouters said, and flight testing is almost complete. At the same time, Wouters stated that the flap design had yet to be finalized because of a failure to reach stall speed goals. Most recently, the Vision has been undergoing autopilot flight testing while simultaneously flying around the country on a demonstration tour.
