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FLYHT Aerospace Solutions Ltd. is pleased to announce that they have agreed to provide through Datang Mobile Aviation division, the AFIRS 228 real-time data communications and SATCOM solution complete with FLYHTStream. The system for Satcom voice and all other data services has been successfully installed on the ARJ21 and used during icing tests for the final validation of the Type Certificate for this aircraft. The ARJ21 has been under development by COMAC and certification testing by AVIC for several years and to date, has orders 415 units from Chinese airlines, customers in Pakistan and various African countries. The first customer deliveries of the aircraft are expected in late 2014.
Mr Dong, general manager of Datang Aviation stated that, “We are very pleased to be part of the role out of this major milestone in Chinese aviation history and our work with FLYHT has been very easy to come to a mutually beneficial solution for COMAC.”
The AFIRS System will be standard fit on the production aircraft and will be used for performance measurement, warranty data monitoring as well as communication with the operations groups in the airline and air traffic control as allowed by regulation. It is anticipated that all customers will activate the data services on the aircraft to take advantage of the cost savings offered by the AFIRS UpTime solution set.
Mr. Wu of AVIC stated that, “The performance of the AFIRS unit during our trials was superb and we are excited to be providing this state of the art capability to our customers as part of our standard delivery. We are also pleased that the AFIRS unit will provide an approved solution to the Satcom mandate in China.”
Bill Tempany, president and CEO of FLYHT stated, “This is a major milestone for our company. We told our investors that we were working to sign new commercial OEM’s to our technology and this is a little ahead of schedule, which is unusual in our industry. We are very proud to be a part of the exciting future that COMAC and AVIC have embarked upon with this inaugural commercial aircraft launch.”
We currently have an order for 4 units for final test and first delivery aircraft and the value of that order including 5 years services for these units is $560,000. When all 415 units have been delivered, the total value over the next 5 years for this agreement including services will be in excess of $40,000,000 USD. Those values will be achieved if all installation occur on time and the customer uses the services anticipated.
AFIRS and its companion product UpTime is in use in more than 40 aircraft operators globally, installed on more than 400 aircraft and currently operating on more than 300 in the field today. Other products offered by FLYHT enhance the operational effectiveness of their customers and is a highly regarded product amongst FLYHT’s customer base.
