Robinson Helicopter CEO Kurt Robinson sees a troubled 2019 for the light helicopter market. Torrance, California-based Robinson, the world’s largest producer of light civil helicopters, has held production steady at an average annual rate of close to 300 units since 2014, including 305 in 2017.
This year, Kurt Robinson thinks that number may be a little bit better. In early December he predicted the company would manufacture approximately 35 R22 two-seat piston singles, 200 R44 four-seat piston singles, and 74 R66 turbine singles in 2018. “It’s going to be a little bit more than 300 aircraft,” he said.
But he believes his company will be hard-pressed to match those numbers next year. “I see weakness ahead,” he told AIN. “Seventy percent of our sales are exports. You take higher interest rates, a stronger dollar, and more tariffs on China and Russia and I’m not as optimistic as I have been in the last couple of years.”