At both a large invited-guests-only event and a next-day press conference on the eve of the 2002 NBAA Convention in Orlando, Fla. last month, Gulfstream Aerospace announced a major transformation of its product line that not only revises the familiar nomenclature of its business jets, but also segments them by options and mission profiles into market niches never before directly targeted by Gulfstream. As part of the new product line, the Savannah, Ga. airframer also announced it is developing a derivative of the former Astra SPX.
Capitalizing on its 2001 acquisition of the type certificates for the former IAI/Galaxy Aerospace Astra SPX and Galaxy jets–which Gulfstream renamed the G100 and G200, respectively–the company is working on the G150, a G100 derivative with a wider fuselage and an aerodynamically cleaner nose. Meanwhile, it is dropping the Roman-numeral suffixes from its familiar homegrown business jets, also giving them “G-hundred” designations. The in-production GIV-SP, for example, will morph into two models, the G300 and G400, after the 500th GIV is built, while the in-development GV-SP will become the G550 and to a lesser degree the G500, after the 200th GV comes off the assembly line in Savannah. Gulfstream has delivered 184 green GVs to date, of which 160 are in service.
