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 Very Light Jets mean business. The boardrooms of our fast-moving world of Very Light Jets have attracted some of the finest minds and progressive thinkers on the planet. Vern Raburn, founder, president and CEO of Eclipse Aviation, personifies the mindset of these visionary corporate warriors. It is the great fortune of Very Light Jet Magazine to interview Vern about his flying, his company, and the future of VLJs.
VLJM: Hello Vern. Tell us when you fell in love with flying and how you got your flying experience.
VERN RABURN: Well, it really started with my family's passion for flight. My father was chief engineer at Douglas Aircraft in Tulsa, Oklahoma until 1957, when he began working in the space program. He eventually retired as the VP in charge of the Delta missile program. And during WWII, my uncle was a flight test engineer for Cessna. My brother and I stayed with my Uncle during the summers in western Oklahoma. When I was about 10, I had the chance to fly in a DC-3 and the pilot let me steer. It was an incredible moment, and I realized this was something I had to keep doing. I joined the Civil Air Patrol when I was 11, and I got to fly a Piper Cub with them when I was 12. My father had been transferred to Douglas headquarters in California, and I soloed in a Cessna 150 at Torrance Airport in Santa Monica at 16. Unfortunately, I have been wearing glasses since I was in sixth or seventh grade, so I was not eligible to be in the Air Force or fly for the airlines. Lasik didn't exist back then, so a career as a professional pilot was out of the question. But, I kept flying all through college and into my career in software as well. My type ratings include the DC series: DC-3, DC-4, DC-6, and DC-7 and then the Constellation, all the Convairs: 240, 440, 480, Howard 500 and the Lodestar L-18. I also have type ratings in the B-25 and B-26. I got to fly the B-17 quite a bit, and flew the B-24 a little too. I had my Connie for almost 15 years, and we put a little over 2,000 hours on it. We probably showed it to close to two million people before I sold it to Korean Airlines and they put it in a museum in Korea. Tell us how your days at Microsoft and your other exciting stops on the path of business led you to the founding of Eclipse Aviation.
I started as an aeronautical engineer major at Cal Poly, but decided, due to the state of the aerospace industry back then, it would be too limiting to my career. So I changed to industrial technology and graduated from Long Beach in 1976. While finishing my classes at Long Beach at night, I went to work for the 3M Company, where I did a ton of data processing. I started reading about microcomputers, which I thought would be incredibly empowering for businesses and people in general. I was inspired, and decided to open one of Los Angeles' first computer stores. Eventually, I became a customer of Bill Gates and he offered me a job at Microsoft, where I spent four incredible years. At the time, Microsoft was a true start up run by a group of very smart, but relatively inexperienced, young people. We felt we were destined to change the world, and looking back it's amazing to know that we were indeed shaping the technology industry. After Microsoft, I spent time in a variety of executive positions at Lotus Development, Symantec and Slate Corporation, and then I took over as CEO of Vulcan's Paul Allen Group. This is where the idea for Eclipse really took root. I made a lot of technology investments that required me to travel all over the country. It was a tough schedule, and many times, it was easier to drive eight hours than fly the airlines. Eventually the company decided to get a Cessna Citation CJ private jet, and in the next 22 months I flew that CJ close to 1,000 hours. I was able to get to places faster, but it was pretty expensive. I realized that while the time savings associated with jet access were amazing, the economics were keeping a lot of people out of corporate aviation that could have benefited tremendously from it. On another front, Williams International was working with NASA to develop a new engine to power small jets weighing less than 6,000 pounds. It was a window of opportunity and everything was happening in a way that allowed me to start the ball rolling with Eclipse. What has been the most difficult part of the process of creating an entirely new aircraft?
Raising the money. In the early days, everything was in place in terms of opportunity, market, technology and propulsion - and everyone agreed that it was a great idea. But, no one wanted to put any money into it at that time because there was this perception that you could go invest in an Internet company and triple your money in 90 days. It was hard to compete with that. So I had to bring a credible business plan to investors and convince them that it could be done and that we were the ones capable of doing it. A lot of our early investors were Challenger, Gulfstream and Lear owners. They understood how expensive owning a private jet could be, but they also understood the time savings, which was immeasurable in some cases. The Eclipse 500 has won the hearts and minds of aviators and travelers the world over. Tell us more about it.
 The Eclipse 500 is a real game changer. It's affordable, it's an amazing performer and it's safe. Where else can you get a twin turbofan aircraft that can take you up to 41,000 feet, fly at 370 knots and go for 1,125 miles for only $1.5 million? Aviation is an industry where aircraft traditionally get more expensive as they improve. But, in the technology world, the law of the land is that features and capabilities increase while costs decrease. We're bringing this philosophy to aviation. To create the Eclipse 500, we used innovations and business practices forged in the technology industry to drive down cost while increasing performance. As a result, the Eclipse 500 is significantly safer, easier and less expensive to operate than traditional business aircraft, and more efficient to produce. Also, the Eclipse 500 will serve a lot of small communities where there currently is no airline service, and people are naturally concerned about noise. However, during testing the Eclipse 500 proved to be the quietest jet aircraft in history. It came in magnitudes of orders below Stage 4 noise requirements, which are the industry's most stringent. As a result, the Eclipse 500 is quieter than most piston aircraft and turboprops. You aren't even going to know it's over your house unless you happen to look up. How do we get more information on purchasing Eclipse?
You can call our sales line at 1-877-375-7978 to speak to a sales representative, or email us at
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. Where do you see the VLJs as a group in the year 2010?
Very Light Jets are a disruptive technology, so you will see them used in ways that haven't even been thought of yet to serve existing as well as new markets. By 2010, Eclipse Aviation alone will be building about 1,000 aircraft a year. You're going to see a lot of changes in the way people travel regionally, and a shift away from the commercial airline hub and spoke system. Based on research we commissioned from CRA International, by the year 2017, typical VLJ-based air taxi communities will experience nearly $16 million in economic activity and generate nearly 150 permanent jobs associated with VLJs. Overall economic activity related to VLJs will total nearly $24 billion in output, $6.9 billion in earnings and more than 189,000 jobs. So the VLJ movement will have a major economic impact on our nation over time. The VLJs will also have a huge impact in the international markets. I see the VLJ not so much changing how people travel in other parts of the world but enabling them to actually travel by plane! You are the recipient of many awards, including the prestigious Robert J. Collier Trophy. Tell us about that experience.
It was an incredible validation of the work we have been doing for the past eight years. And I was so proud to share it with the employees, customers and partners that have made this dream a reality. It was also humbling to join a list of winners the likes of Orville Wright and Glenn Curtiss - people that I grew up idolizing. You know, the experience I had at Microsoft gives me an interesting perspective on this time at Eclipse. Often you're too close to the day-to-day to really understand the impact you're making. Winning the Collier Trophy provided us with the opportunity to step back, take a breath and realize that we're making history. Thank you, Vern Raburn, for your great contributions to our world of Very Light Jets and for your time with Very Light Jet Magazine. |
