With the region representing only a tenth of Cirrus Aircraft’s global sales – including just 40 or so of roughly 600 single-engine Vision Jets operating worldwide – Europe offers plenty potential for the Minnesota-based manufacturer. The Aero regular is back in Friedrichshafen, displaying its piston-single SR22 as well as the Vision Jet.
Thanks to typically short flying distances and the 1,275nm (2,360km)-range Vision Jet’s ability to fly over mountain ranges such as the Alps and Pyrenees at 31,000ft, Cirrus products are perfect for the continent’s owner-pilots, asserts chief executive Zean Nielsen.
Cirrus arrives Aero Friedrichshafen this week after another impressive 2024, during which it increased shipments year on year of all its four lines – the original baseline SR20, two versions of the higher-performance SR22, and the SF50 Vision Jet, which was certificated in Europe in 2017, a year after the USA. In total, Cirrus delivered 731 aircraft, including 101 Vision Jets, breaking the treble figure barrier for that type for the first time, according to General Aviation Manufacturers Association figures.
January last year also saw the launch of the latest version of its SR Series. The Generation 7 comes with Garmin’s Perspective Touch+ avionics suite with dual touch controllers, as well as comfort enhancements and improved safety systems “to make single pilot flying even safer”, according to Nielsen. Sales of the variant in the first two months after the announcement “shattered all records”, he says, although these have since “plateaued down”.
The move also brought the flying experience of the SR Series closer than ever to the SF50. “We simplified the cockpit, making the jump into the jet much easier,” he says. “There was sometimes a bit of trepidation about moving up to the Vision Jet, but this way transitioning to the new type rating becomes much easier.”
That came just after an update to the Vision Jet announced at the 2023 AirVenture show in Oshkosh that included an automated weather tracking system as part of the Garmin avionics that Cirrus says provides improved situational awareness during bad weather. Software that collates aircraft data such as fuel levels and flight hours for owners via an app was also part of the package.
However, it is perhaps its safety features that Cirrus is best known for. When it came on the market in 1998, the Continental IO-360-engined SR20 was the first in general aviation to feature a parachute that could lower the aircraft to the ground after a loss of control or pilot incapacitation incident. The technology was later included in the IO-550-powered SR22 and the Vision Jet, and Cirrus claims it has helped save over 250 lives.
In 2020, Cirrus followed that with the Garmin-developed Safe Return emergency autoland system on the Williams International FJ33-5A-powered Vision Jet. Activated by a passenger or pilot pressing a button or automatically if there is a sudden loss of cabin pressure, the software autonomously guides the aircraft to the nearest safe landing area.
Although it has never been deployed in a real-life situation – except by accident when it has been quickly manually deactivated – Safe Return remains a “huge selling feature” for the jet. It is especially popular with many owners’ families given that the typical customer does not fly for a living, says Nielsen.
Nielsen maintains that many of Cirrus’s recent product improvements originate from an innovation centre established at its Duluth airport campus in 2022. Based in a 17,600sq m (189,000sq ft) former maintenance hangar, the facility houses almost 500 engineers who can work in a close-knit, collaborative environment. The development has substantially reduced innovation cycles, he says.
It has also helped with recruitment, retention, team-working and motivation following the pandemic when many young professionals were falling into the habit of working remotely and losing the ability to interact creatively. “We created a great space for people to come back to after Covid,” says Nielsen, a former Tesla executive who took over the running of the now Chinese-owned firm from co-founder Dale Klapmeier of in 2019.
Perhaps surprisingly, for someone who used to work for the world’s best known electric vehicle brand, Nielsen is ambivalent about the prospects for electric-powered aircraft, and, unlike some manufacturers, has avoided any high-profile involvement in alternative propulsion initiatives.
“We have done some studies into different sorts of propulsion system, but two fundamental things come into play: the weight of batteries when what you’re trying to do with an aircraft is defy gravity, and the cost of designing a system,” he says. Instead, Cirrus has focused on more mundane environmental targets, such as ways to reduce the lead in aviation fuel.
Nielsen insists that, while Cirrus has been affected by industry-wide delays and shortages of parts, “by and large we have navigated things better than most” thanks to a supply chain that is 97% based in the USA – something that may also provide a safeguard should Trump administration import tariffs on many industrial raw materials and other goods take effect.
Above all, Cirrus has remained a champion of the consumer, insists Nielsen. “A lot of OEMs have put up their prices a lot in recent years. We’ve adjusted our pricing but not as aggressively,” he says. “We try very hard to be an advocate for the owner. Our mission is to create pilots and to keep down the cost of owning an airplane.”
