Was Purchased In July By German Company LIFTAir

Flight Design may be under new ownership, but it will continue to be a leader in the design and manufacturing of advance light aircraft.

Flight Design was acquired by LIFTAir of Eisenach, Germany in July of 2017. As an indicator of the new owner's future plans, the company has been rebranded as Flight Design General Aviation GmbH.

LIFTAir founder and owner Sven Lindig has established a number of successful businesses in the Central and Southern areas of Germany. He is known for an innovative and collaborative approach to business management and is also very active in the local community. “We were very pleased to acquire the complete assets of Flight Design and are committed to keeping the company in its leading position in the design and manufacturing of advanced light aircraft," he said.

As a part of the acquisition, LIFTAir now owns the Flight Design EASA Design Organization, the Flight Design aircraft production facility in Kherson Ukraine and the design rights for all products produced by the company. The company headquarters are at the modern LiftAir engineering facility at Kindel airport (EDGE) located near the historic town of Eisenach in the State of Thuringia, Germany.

Flight Design’s new management team is headed by CEO Lars Joerges, a businessman from the region with experience in advanced composites and technology development. He is also a business turnaround specialist. His passion for aviation began as a young man flying sailplanes and continues to this day. “Flight Design is well known as an innovator in the design of light aircraft and also for opening new markets for those aircraft. We now want to also lead in customer support and production," Joerges said. "We plan to surprise people with some new ideas in spare part support and customer communication.”

The factory in Kherson, Ukraine is seeing investment and upgrades. First up were a new paint booth and improvements to the physical plant itself which will help improve productivity. Production of aircraft and parts which was maintained at a low rate for the last year and a half are now up to 4 aircraft a month and a healthy backlog of aircraft orders is building for 2018.

Delivery times for new orders are now quoted at 3 months from receipt of a 12% deposit to completion and test flown at the Kindel airport. All deposits are held in an escrow account and guaranteed by LIFTAir’s parent company, LIFT holding. Final payment is only due after the aircraft is completed, final inspected and test flown.

“We are very excited to be working with the new owners and management at Flight Design general aviation,” said Tom Peghiny, President of Flight Design USA. “We have been working with them for a year and a half and they have been very supportive of our business and have great plans for the future. To begin with they have helped us get a full running inventory of parts again to shorten lead times and to be able to offer AOG special delivery of repair parts again.

“Airtime in Tulsa got the first 2 new CTLSi from Germany earlier this year and they looked great. We are getting a new CTLSi GT (Grand Touring) in the 2020 compliant configuration in January. This will be our demonstrator for the new year and we look forward to participating in all the major shows in the USA again”, Said Tom. “Flight Design USA is what Flight Design calls a Regional Center for North and South America. We are working directly with the Flight Design distributors in the USA, Canada, Mexico, Brazil and other Central and South American countries."

For 2018 Flight Design general aviation is offering the CTLSi GT which is a lightly upgraded version of the CTLSi Flight Design USA has been importing since 2012. The primary change is offering an upgraded Dynon avionics package including the Dynon 10” SkyView Touch HDX screens which are very bright and high definition for the EFIS and Map screens (left and right) and a 7” SkyView Touch HDX at the top of the center stack which is used alternately for EMS and autopilot control. If you haven’t seen the Skyview Touch HDX, you will be impressed with the improved touch screen and the angled lower control panel which allows easy adjustment of the settings. The easy-to-use and popular Garmin 796 is also available as a replacement of the 7” Dynon center screen.

The CTLSi GT 2020 Edition which is the configuration that we have selected for sale in the USA and the package offers the best value for the owner. It includes the highly rated Rotax 912iS fuel injected 100HP engine and as standard equipment a complete Dynon avionics suite including in addition the abovementioned HDX screens, Level button, push-button starting, Dynon SV-261 Remote ES transponder which has the 2020 compliant ADS-B (Out) feature, the SV-470 ADS-B 9 (In) which provides the free satellite based traffic and weather function, the Dynon SV-2 axis autopilot, which has greatly improved functionality when coupled to the center 7” touchscreen.

(Source: Flight Design General Aviation news release. Images from file)

FMI: www.flightdesign.com