Duluth, MN Company Flies Over The Great Wall

On the heels of their announcement of an unprecedented 116 new aircraft orders for the month of November, Cirrus Design Corporation announced Thursday plans have been finalized to open their first Cirrus sales center in China. The inaugural China sales center will open at the General Aviation airport in Shanghai during the first half of February, 2006.

John M. Bingham, Executive Vice-President of Sales & Marketing for Cirrus, said that an agreement has been signed with Shanghai AVMall International Trading Co., Ltd., to become an authorized Cirrus Sales and Support Center. AVMall will take delivery of their first Cirrus, an SR22, in March.

Another Cirrus slated for demonstration flights will be owned and operated by the Cirrus Shanghai Representative Office. "The new organization will be called the Cirrus Shanghai Sales Center and will be operated by the capable China aviation expert Mr. Li Linhai," said Bingham.

Li -- widely regarded across China as the first private Chinese citizen to obtain private individual aircraft ownership -- is the manager of China’s first private flight club, Qianyuan (Frontier). He is also an enthusiastic supporter of Cirrus aircraft, according to the company.

"Cirrus is a world-class aircraft manufacturer," said Li. "Our organization, AVMall, is extremely honored that Cirrus has placed their trust in us to become their first sales center in China."

Li added, "I’m confident that our market will be eager to fly the exceptional Cirrus and that the brand will quickly become the ultimate high-end status symbol."

Peter Claeys, Cirrus Regional Sales Director for China and SE Asia said, "We want very much to help develop the General Aviation market across China. We’re excited with this opportunity to support a local sales center here in Shanghai and hope in the future that we can explore the possibility of expansion."

Claeys said that much strategic consideration went into the location selection process for the first Cirrus sales center, and that Shanghai was selected due to its centralized geographic location and its strength as a center for commerce and finance.

Claeys's group is now working to obtain the Validation of Type Certificate (VTC) for the Cirrus aircraft series in China, a prerequisite to the application of the airworthiness certificates granted by China’s governing aviation organization known as the Civil Aviation Authority of China (CAAC).

Historically, entering the potentially enormous China marketplace has been severely restricted for private airplane manufacturers. According to the CAAC, less than 100 privately-owned airplanes exist on the Chinese mainland -- in contrast to 200,000 in the US. Until recently, China has prohibited the granting of airplane ownership licenses to individuals -- but those policies eased after the new Regulation on Flight Control of General Aviation took effect in May 2003.

Under the new rules CAAC opened its airspace -- once tightly controlled by the government and the military -- to private aircraft owners. This easing of restrictions has drawn interest from companies such as Cirrus to now enter the China marketplace.

Bingham said Cirrus sees enormous growth potential in China, the world’s most populous country with over 1.3 billion people.

"We will search and identify new opportunities in China, mainly to support business development. Our prospects will be business owners and private individuals who recognize the benefits of having a personal transportation aircraft."

Claeys said, "Once the regulations are in place, we see the personal transportation airplane concept developing in this market in much the same way that the automotive industry grew rapidly in China. This market has an appreciation for state-of-the-art technology and a desire for quality imported products. China is forecast to become the second largest aviation market by 2020, and we want to make sure that Cirrus is well positioned to take advantage of this unprecedented growth and leverage this phenomenal opportunity."

Bingham added that Cirrus will expand in the future as necessary -- to accommodate not only aircraft sales, but also airplane support.

FMI: www.cirrusdesign.com