Vern Raburn: the Eclipse founder who risked it all on the VLJ dream

A lesson in hubris or an inspiration for aerospace visionaries? The former IT executive behind the Albuquerque-based start-up was both an entrepreneurial failure and GA disruptor

The career of Vern Raburn – who has died aged 75 – is either a lesson in hubris for all those who would revolutionise commercial aerospace, from supersonic travel to advanced air mobility, or an inspiration for today’s would-be industry disruptors.

Eclipse Aviation’s founder was an IT multi-millionaire and former sidekick of Bill Gates who sunk much of his fortune into developing the first very-light jet (VLJ), the Eclipse 500. It spawned at least half a dozen imitators and created an entire new business aviation segment.

Raburn’s reasoning was that the established general aviation manufacturers had failed to innovate in decades. Some of the most popular types in service had been designed before Elvis hit the charts (many are still flying).

He set up Eclipse in 1998, pledging to produce a six-seat twinjet in its thousands that would perform on a par with large, fast corporate aircraft operating at 40,000ft for the price of a piston-twin.

The Albuquerque-based start-up would achieve these remarkable numbers by adopting automotive-like production and procurement systems, achieving economies of scale that would allow it to massively undercut and outperform the competition.

Eclipse’s sales and marketing strategy targeted a new breed of air taxi operators, such as Florida’s DayJet, which ordered Eclipse 500s in their hundreds, as well as GA pilots that had never flown a jet, and even those new to aviation.

With customer commitments stretching into the thousands, Raburn believed he could disrupt a staid sector by democratising private jet travel. In the end he presided over one of the industry’s largest corporate failures.

Eclipse Aviation did begin delivering the Eclipse 500 in modest numbers after its certification in 2006, but limits on its ability to fly in known icing impacted prospects, as did the 2008 demise of marquee customer DayJet as the global financial crisis took hold. Lenders, suppliers, and customers began to lose confidence.

Meeting the charismatic and ever upbeat Raburn was a delight – his enthusiasm undimmed even after the collapse of his dream. Post-Eclipse, in the mid-2010s he took on the chief executive role at the short-lived Google offshoot Titan Aerospace.

A private pilot – whose personal aircraft collection included a Lockheed Constellation he flew regularly to air shows – and always more at home in a polo shirt than business suit, his evangelistic zeal for revolutionising GA was infectious.

He recruited a relatively young team of managers and engineers for his enterprise in a city not known for its aerospace heritage, with the promise of creating something entirely novel – a high-performance jet within the reach of everyday private pilots and one with which air taxi pioneers could create networks.

While VLJs never really caught on – other types such as the Piper Altaire, Diamond D-Jet, Cessna Mustang, and Adam A700 failed to make it to production or were cancelled after disappointing sales – Raburn did leave a lasting legacy.

Dozens of Eclipse 500 owners still fly and love the jet and there have been rumours over the years of production restarting. It could also be argued that Cirrus’s single-engined Vision Jet, the only personal jet in production, would never have happened without the Eclipse 500 proving the concept.

Raburn joins that heavenly circle of aviation pioneers – from the Wright Brothers through Sir Frank Whittle, Joe Sutter and Igor Sikorsky – who dared to be different and push the industry out of its comfort zone. The odds may have been stacked against Eclipse Aviation from the start – and plenty of sceptics were proved right when bankruptcy loomed – but Raburn was a visionary prepared to take the risk.