15 February 2008
The USA-based GAMA (General Aviation Manufacturers Association) has released its end-of-year summary of light aircraft sales in 2007. The figures show that while deliveries of business jets (which includes VLJs) were up by 25 percent from 886 to 1,138 worldwide, piston-engine shipments fell slightly from 2,755 in 2006 to 2,675 in 2007.
Among individual manufacturers, Cessna sold 1,274 aircraft (both jets and propeller aircraft) not surprisingly making them the single largest manufacturer. 373 of those aircraft were C172s, 301 were C182s and 131 were StationAirs. 45 of their sales were Citation Mustangs. Interestingly, the ‘new’ Cessna 350 and 400 types (former Columbia types acquired by Cessna, along with the company, in the Autumn) each sold one airframe. In their former life as Columbias, they sold 34 and 118 examples respectively.
Second largest sales were those of Cirrus, with 710 aircraft (588 of them SR22s) and third were Diamond with 471, the majority being DA40s. Piper sold 221 aircraft.
The bare figures, however, don’t tell the full story: in terms of money taken, Bombadier was 2007’s highest scorer, with $5.2 billion taken from 226 deliveries (Learjets, Challengers and Global 5000s); Gulfstream took $4.8 billion for its 138 jet deliveries. Cessna, in comparison, netted $3.9 billion.
