Piper prepares for ‘unprecedented global push’

This past year, Piper Aircraft Inc. set the stage for an “unprecedented global push” in 2011, according to officials with the Vero Beach, Florida-based company.

“During 2010, the first full year since Imprimis acquired Piper, the company made memorable and notable progress in a number of important areas,” said Piper CEO Geoffrey Berger. “We delivered considerably more aircraft, introduced and stepped up development of an all-new single-engine business jet, and readied the company for an unprecedented global push in 2011.”

While fourth quarter and full-year Piper deliveries will not be publicly announced until February, production activity at the company’s Vero Beach manufacturing campus during 2010 was up by more than 75% compared to 2009, despite a significant overall decline in industry deliveries by other manufacturers, according to company officials, noting “this substantial market share increase reflected Piper’s aggressive globalization efforts.”

The company unveiled the  PiperJet Altaire (pictured below) in October and added more than 140 engineers to the business jet’s development team with planned certification and deliveries set for 2014. Total Piper employment grew by several hundred employees to support the increased production.

Piper opened two new global sales offices: one to serve the Americas region and one in Amsterdam to support the European, Middle East and Africa region. The company’s third regional sales office in Brunei was reinforced with the addition of the company’s director of global fleet sales to enlarge the company’s presence, particularly in the Asia/Pacific region.

Piper logged fleet sales of more than 45 aircraft to pilot training institutions throughout Asia/Pacific and the United States. While the company is not disclosing fleet purchase prices, retail value of the single-engine and twin-engine aircraft sold to flight training institutions worldwide in 2010 totals about $21 million, up considerably from the previous year.

The overall globalization initiative has already begun to pay off with foreign sales accounting for more than half of the company’s new aircraft sales by dollar and unit volume for the first time in recent Piper history.

For more information: Piper.com