Press Release

Issued by Aviation Partners.

July 31, 2015

Aviation Partners, Inc. (API) announced today that the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) recently granted supplemental type certificate (STC) approval for the Split Scimitar Winglet (SSW) retrofit on BBJ aircraft. The approval was granted to Aviation Partners Boeing (APB), a joint venture between API and The Boeing Company, on July 28th, and comes on the heels of FAA STC approval which was announced at the EBACE Convention earlier this year. Boeing Business Jets also announced at EBACE that the SSWs are now standard on new 737NG-based BBJ aircraft.

Using a newly patented API design, the SSW program completely redefines the aerodynamics of the existing Blended Winglet. The retrofit to the existing Blended Winglet consists of adding a new Scimitar-tipped large ventral strake, beef up of internal winglet structure, and replacement of the aluminum winglet tip caps with new aerodynamically shaped Scimitar tip caps. The unique feature of the SSW is that it builds on the existing Blended Winglet design to provide a dramatic performance improvement without increasing the existing wing span. For long-range BBJ operations, the SSW will provide a drag reduction, and corresponding range increase, of two plus percent over the current Blended Winglet configuration.

“We are already seeing huge interest in Split Scimitar Winglets from the BBJ community. The range benefit is tremendously compelling given the missions many BBJ owners undertake,” said Gary Dunn, API vice president of sales & marketing, “the upgrade will essentially give a BBJ with seven aux tanks the range of an eight aux tank airplane.”

With this recent EASA approval the SSW retrofit, already approved for Boeing 737-700, -800 and -900 series airliners, is now both FAA and EASA approved for all BBJ, BBJ2 and BBJ3 business jets. Two BBJs are already in-service with SSWs, with several BBJ and BBJ2 SSW retrofits in-work or scheduled through the end of 2015.

API is the exclusive provider of SSWs for all BBJ, BBJ2 and BBJ3 aircraft; in addition to original Blended Winglets for vip Boeing 757/767 as well as Falcon 900/2000/50 series and Hawker 800 series airframes.