India’s Kingfisher Airlines is now half owner of Epic Aircraft, the young Oregon-based OEM. The deal will also give Epic access to Airbus resources as it strives to accelerate certification of new aircraft including its Elite and Victory very light jets.
“We will still be operating the company,” said Epic president and chief executive Rick Schrameck. Ownership is 50/50 under the $200 million deal with Kingfisher chairman Vijay Mallya.
He is also head of UB Holdings, which owns 26% of Deccan Aviation.
Kingfisher’s relationship with Airbus opens the door for their personnel to help the much smaller Epic’s certification. “It’s really on the technical side,” Schrameck says.
Mallya did not travel to Atlanta today, but Kingfisher executive vice-president Hitesh Patel said: “Epic’s aircraft would be ideal for the Indian market.”
Epic is in the advanced stages of flight testing for the Dynasty, its 1,200hp (895kW) single-engine turboprop.
At July’s AirVenture show in Oshkosh it unveiled two new very light jets, the twin-engined Elite and the single-engined Victory. The jets will begin their certification process immediately following certification of the Dynasty.
Today’s announcement puts greater focus on producing those aircraft, which are now available both as certificated aircraft and kitplanes.
“Our stated goal in doing this was that we had to build up to 400 aircraft manufacturing capacity as soon as possible,” said Schrameck.
Source: Flight Daily News
