I think you just went too far....

Disappointing that Aerion could not come up with enough capital to continue this project. Not too difficult from a technology standpoint. Kind of surprising that it turned out this way considering all the back orders.

Not sure which is cheaper. Militaries have been building both for a long time and an ICBM might come in a bit cheaper than a fighter, although the latter has better avionics and a longer life cycle

The big price jump is going from high subsonic to supersonic but the price jump from Mach 1+ to Mach 2 isn't nearly as high.

Look at all the true Mach 2 airplanes from about 1960 on (from all countries). The overall shape of something you're trying to push that fast through the air hasn't changed greatly- a lot of the differences are tactical more than aerodynamic, and the aerodynamic improvements have been incremental and evolutionary rather than revolutionary. Propulsion has evolved but the basic proportions have changed little (how big the engines are compared to the airframe).

What you're left with is a package with fairly predictable proportions of the airplane itself, the fuel it requires, and the payload it carries. What made the Aerion special was the noise-attenuating aerodynamics but aside from that it seems to have more in common with the many large, fast, long-legged Russian Cold War aircraft than it does with modern business jets.

I thought it was a really neat concept and I'm sorry to see this news.

I think what keeps killing supersonic civilian aircraft is cost / efficiency.

Supersonic aerodynamics is less efficient than subsonic, for pretty fundamental reasons. So you need more fuel to travel the same distance. As an example a early 747 L/D was 17 and concord was 7 (at cruise speed)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lift-to-drag_ratio

Emperical L/D supersonic (see above) is L/D ~ 4*(M+3)/M, so Mach 2, expect L/D around 10, about 1/2 of a modern subsonic aircraft.

Supersonic doesn't buy you much time on short flights, so its useful on those same flights where fuel is starting to eat into your useful load, so not only do you spend 2X on fuel but you carry less - so its even worse.

Above about mach 2, lots of things get hard (engines, thermal etc)

The market just seems to prefer slower, but much larger / more comfortable planes at the same cost. A supersonic biz jet sounds great - but if the choice is a business class seat at Mach 2, or a full suite with a bed, etc at Mach 0.85, most people will choose the latter. Get to your destination in 12 hours rather than 6, but after a nigth's sleep, and with a comfrotable place to work during the trip.

Quiet supersonic jet company shuts down...quietly.

Will Boom be next to go Bust?

Film at Eleven.

News today from inside GE- they are shutting down the engine development program that was intended to produce Aerion's engines. There is no other customer on the horizon for the unique engines required, at this time.

I think you just went too far....

This "locomotive" only exists because California threw a $22 million dollar grant at it. Which is more than four times the cost of a conventional locomotive. It can't do anything without being coupled to at least one other locomotive.

It’s a question of comfort. People will pay double for first/business class and I’d bet spending half the time in the airplane is a similar gain in comfort.

Problem is you can’t sell 200 first class seats on one airplane, to make it only cost twice as much. There’s no case for economy.

I love the idea of supersonic flight but these guys seem only slightly more credible than the flying car guys. The $100 flight thing is the biggest red flag yet.

The only market I see is among the increasingly large number of fantastically wealthy people, but they’d have to charge hundreds of millions a copy. Not sure that set wants to pay that when they could fly slower in their own 787 for the same money.

The only market I see is among the increasingly large number of fantastically wealthy people, but they’d have to charge hundreds of millions a copy. Not sure that set wants to pay that when they could fly slower in their own 787 for the same money.

Did they have deposits on 91 aircraft? LOIs aren’t sales.

These LOI's required a $250k deposit. Seven years ago they reported the first 50 LOI's and deposits that initiated the next development phase. I would be certain they accumulated the next 41 deposits since then in order to claim the backlog they reported.

Aerion is returning the deposits now.

Let's see who ends up with the significant IP generated so far. Dassault and Gulfstream both have said they would produce an SSBJ if the continental overflight ban was removed.

But coudl they really meet their promises specs at only 120M/plane?



The market is there, they had an $11 billion dollar order book at $120 million per jet. That's 91 jets already spoken for. With $4 billion expected in development costs, that leaves a good return on the table. But the environment for projects like this has changed since January.

I think you and I are thinking along similar lines.

$120m is about double to triple the price of current business jets. It's also about double the price of a new F-18. That's not a great comparison other than both are large~ish airplanes that top out just over Mach 1, in other words big pieces of metal and composite that can go a thousand miles an hour. Consider the differences that could make the price go up or down, or maybe make no difference:

- production run in the dozens (91 orders and counting) vs several hundred
- one's purpose is to carry a pressure vessel big enough for 10-12 passengers, the other's is to carry a lot of specialized mission equipment
- other airframe differences for transport category vs, uhhh, unlimited aerobatics
- Aerion is aerodynamically optimized for fast cruise, F-18 optimized for much lower cruise speed and uses excess thrust to achieve its dash speed



But yeah, I think it could have made the $120m price or at least come close. If they liquidate the intellectual property then somebody else will have an easier time picking it up from here and making that price.

These LOI's required a $250k deposit. Seven years ago they reported the first 50 LOI's and deposits that initiated the next development phase. I would be certain they accumulated the next 41 deposits since then in order to claim the backlog they reported.

Aerion is returning the deposits now.

Let's see who ends up with the significant IP generated so far. Dassault and Gulfstream both have said they would produce an SSBJ if the continental overflight ban was removed.