With the announcement by Cirrus Aircraft president and CEO Brent Wouters that China’s Caiga plans to buy Cirrus (a U.S.-based group is organizing a counter-offer; see page XX), the delayed Vision SF50 single-engine jet program may see an infusion of money. The buyout proposed by China Aviation Industry General Aircraft, a unit of China’s Avic International, is to buy all of Cirrus from the several hundred shareholders who currently own the company, including Bahrain-based Arcapita, which owns 60 percent. Caiga is also buying Continental Motors, which provides the piston engines for Cirrus airplanes.
Details of Caiga’s offer have not been revealed, but in a recent development former aerospace executive Brian Foley is assembling investors to make a counter-offer that would keep Cirrus an American company. Foley believes that the price for Cirrus is in the $200 million range, although it is not known how much of that is debt.
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