Comp Air may open facility; eyeing India

An aircraft manufacturer is negotiating with Melbourne International Airport officials to lease nearly 24,000 square feet of space starting in January.
Comp Air Aviation LLC, an affiliate of Merritt Island-based Comp Air Inc., is scheduled to announce its likely plans for building a single-engine turboprop airplane at Melbourne International during the annual meeting and convention of the National Business Aviation Association today in Orlando.
The project would create 50 jobs initially as the company works to obtain the necessary accreditation by the Federal Aviation Administration to sell the $2.95 million aircraft, known as the Comp Air 12, on a widespread basis, according to Bill Fedorko, Comp Air's chief operating officer.
If the company's ambitious assembly plan takes off and it ends up building 100 planes a year, the creation of 2,000 jobs by 2012 is a possibility, Fedorko said in a news release.
The six- to 10-seat airplane is currently under development, and company executives estimate that it will cost $150 million to get it certified by the third quarter of 2010. The Comp Air 12 uses a single Honeywell turbine engine and a 5-blade McCauley propeller. A prototype took flight earlier this year.
Fedorko said target markets for the plane are the U.S., Russia, China and India.
"There is incredible demand for luxury executive aircraft in those regions," he said in a statement.
06/10/08 Wayne T. Price/Florida Today, USA

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Categories: Foreign Oct 2008, New Oct 2008