Dassault Falcon Jet is not only applying the most technologically advanced design to its new Falcon 7X trijet, but is using advanced organizational techniques to make sure it produces the best aircraft it possibly can.

Customers, apparently, are confident that Dassault can do it-the aircraft, priced at $37.15 million in June 2002 dollars, is very nearly sold out through 2007, company president John Rosanvallon said here Monday.

There are upwards of 30 orders in hand from 41 letters of intent that had been received since the end of 2001. The Falcon 7X is to make its first flight in early 2005 with deliveries to commence in the second half of 2006.

Organizationally, "We have 18 partners, risk-sharing partners," Dassault vice-chairman Bruno Revellin-Falcoz said here. Some 380 people, about two-thirds of them from Dassault and the rest from other team members, are working together at Dassault's engineering facility at Paris-St. Cloud. They're at work on a virtual reality mock-up of the new jet in an area dubbed the "plateau."

The 7X designers "live together and face the difficulties on a daily basis," Revellin-Falcoz said. "Everybody is involved in creating mutual solutions." The plateau arrangement has resolved all questions of systems selection and routing paths, Dassault says; more detailed design will be accomplished with engineers working in their own facilities according to a "virtual plateau" structure.
The Falcon 7X is to have a range of 5,700 nmi with eight passengers and a crew of four-Dassault says it's determined through market research that the aircraft should accommodate a third pilot because it will often be making long flights.

The 7X will be powered by three Pratt & Whitney Canada PW307A engines, which along with a higher aspect ratio wing with a pronounced sweepback angle, will allow aircraft operators to conduct most of their flights at Mach .85 and above.

It'll also have the new EASy cockpit, designed to reduce pilot workload and improve situational awareness. "Our intention is to have the EASy cockpit on all the models," says Dassault senior vp for civil aircraft Jean-François Georges.