The brand owner, Bombardier, said Thursday that it will focus on its most profitable Challenger and Global aircraft. The move will cost 250 jobs at the Learjet plant in Wichita, Kansas.
“With more than 3,000 aircraft delivered since entering service in 1963, the iconic Learjet aircraft has had a notable and lasting impact on business aviation,” said Bombardier CEO Éric Martel. “Passengers around the world love to fly on this exceptional aircraft and count on its unmatched performance and reliability. However, due to the increasingly challenging dynamics of the market, we made this difficult decision to end Learjet production.”
The move is part of a general cut of 1,600 jobs announced by the Canadian company on Thursday. Bombardier also announced a loss of 1.1 billion Canadian dollars (about $ 866 million) in 2020. In the past two years, Bombardier has sold its regional jet and railroad cars business to focus on jets.
The Learjet, which opened in Wichita in 1962 by Bill Lear, was one of the first private jets. Especially in its early days, the Learjet was associated with the rich and famous. Elvis Presley reportedly borrowed Sinatra’s Learjet to escape to Las Vegas in 1967.
It was mentioned in the lyrics of Carly Simon’s 1972 song, “You’re so vain”, in which she sang “You flew with your learjet to Nova Scotia, to see the total eclipse of the sun”. Who she was singing about was never definitively disclosed, but many believe it was actor Warren Beatty.
Currently, celebrities seem to prefer competitors like Gulfstream (Tom Cruise) and Bombardier’s bigger planes, like Global (Oprah) and Challenger (Jay-Z). If you’re Drake, you go with a full-size Boeing 767 – a refurbished commercial jet for private use.
The company was bought by Bombardier in 1990, which started delivering its latest aircraft, the Learjet 75, only last October.
But Learjets are smaller than the Challenger and Global brands of private jets. The Learjet 75 seats six to eight passengers. Challenger, Bombardier’s best-selling brand, owns at least nine, and Global may contain twice that.
The company was hit hard by the pandemic in early 2020, when it cut 2,500 jobs. But demand returned at the end of the year, when some business customers wanted to move from first-class commercial aircraft to their own private jets. The Global 7500 aircraft had a record 16 deliveries in the fourth quarter.
