Re: Has anyone already placed an order for a Panthera?
Posted: Wed Oct 28, 2020 5:19 pm
I wrote to the Diamond CEO. Here is his response;
Dear Mr. Stein,
Thank you for your email and for reaching out directly. First of all, let me tell you that I am very sorry to hear that we are losing a Diamond customer. I agree with several points you have raised below, but also wanted to take the opportunity to explain what actions are being taken and correct some misconceptions with regards to support for legacy aircraft. We have recognized the need for improved support and service (parts, technical and legacy) and began making changes to this effect, after changes to ownership and management were completed post-acquisition of Diamond Aircraft globally. As of November 2019, we began initiating several internal restructuring changes to our after sales, customer support, parts and warranty departments and added additional people to new roles to improve our support and service in North America. We are in the process of restructuring our external support efforts as well, with newly appointed service center contracts, training, additional Austro qualified centers and appointments beginning in November 2020, with plans to be finalized by Q1 2021. We have also successfully implemented a new customer resource management software tool to be used by our customer support and service center network globally and built a more robust “knowledge database” with predictive planning tools to help the group overall. We are also in the process of redefining parts distribution globally and have made changes to parts distribution associated with the modification to the service center network. This has already been implemented in other regions of the world and we have seen good, albeit early success in these areas. We plan to continue to improve our sales and service network across the United States (and globally) over the coming years – this , admittedly, has been Diamond’s biggest weakness in the past and something we are committing to changing!
I have also personally engaged with the DAN network over the past year and have committed to further engagement with Diamond owners / operators and working together to find solutions to some of the lagging issues. That being said, please see points below with respect to the aircraft specific issues identified:
• ADS-B options were / are not limited to WAAS enabled aircraft. As per the Garmin STC SA01714WI, the units can be purchased with or without an external GPS drive.
o Diamond also incorporated OSB 40-084 – to install a dual comm / GPS antenna to be able to facilitate a non-WAAS enabled G1000 installation , to function with the ADS-B installation in STC SA01741WI
• WAAS units have started being delivered in to the field, as a result of our refurb program, and customers are starting the process of having these units installed.
• We continue to work with the DAN Group, to improve issues with our “Legacy Fleet”. While some of the issues we are looking to resolve are not in the price point that most people would prefer, we are making attempts to determine solutions, so that owners can maintain their aircraft in a configuration suited to their required mission profile.
• With respect to all Garmin issues, as you can well imagine, Garmin and Diamond have a long history working in partnership. There are details of the certification process that are not known or understood by those not in the discussions and details. This is a long term project to maintain software, improve software, create new software, and certify and implement this software in the field. This process is by no means short, and we have to balance, along with Garmin, how these projects are incorporated, and how they affect current production aircraft , and Legacy Aircraft. It’s a delicate balance, to ensure we are meeting the needs of legacy issues, while still continuing our development of new production aircraft.
I appreciate your reaching out and hope you can understand that we are attempting to implement real change, not just a band-aide approach. It is not a quick fix and will take time to meet the overall Diamond support that I envision. That being said, we remain committing to fixing and improving this for all Diamond customers, both current and future.
Should you wish to discuss further, I can make myself available for a discussion.
Sincerely,
Scott McFadzean
Chief Executive Officer
Diamond Aircraft Industries Inc.
1560 Crumlin Sideroad ▪ London, Ontario ▪ Canada
Dear Mr. Stein,
Thank you for your email and for reaching out directly. First of all, let me tell you that I am very sorry to hear that we are losing a Diamond customer. I agree with several points you have raised below, but also wanted to take the opportunity to explain what actions are being taken and correct some misconceptions with regards to support for legacy aircraft. We have recognized the need for improved support and service (parts, technical and legacy) and began making changes to this effect, after changes to ownership and management were completed post-acquisition of Diamond Aircraft globally. As of November 2019, we began initiating several internal restructuring changes to our after sales, customer support, parts and warranty departments and added additional people to new roles to improve our support and service in North America. We are in the process of restructuring our external support efforts as well, with newly appointed service center contracts, training, additional Austro qualified centers and appointments beginning in November 2020, with plans to be finalized by Q1 2021. We have also successfully implemented a new customer resource management software tool to be used by our customer support and service center network globally and built a more robust “knowledge database” with predictive planning tools to help the group overall. We are also in the process of redefining parts distribution globally and have made changes to parts distribution associated with the modification to the service center network. This has already been implemented in other regions of the world and we have seen good, albeit early success in these areas. We plan to continue to improve our sales and service network across the United States (and globally) over the coming years – this , admittedly, has been Diamond’s biggest weakness in the past and something we are committing to changing!
I have also personally engaged with the DAN network over the past year and have committed to further engagement with Diamond owners / operators and working together to find solutions to some of the lagging issues. That being said, please see points below with respect to the aircraft specific issues identified:
• ADS-B options were / are not limited to WAAS enabled aircraft. As per the Garmin STC SA01714WI, the units can be purchased with or without an external GPS drive.
o Diamond also incorporated OSB 40-084 – to install a dual comm / GPS antenna to be able to facilitate a non-WAAS enabled G1000 installation , to function with the ADS-B installation in STC SA01741WI
• WAAS units have started being delivered in to the field, as a result of our refurb program, and customers are starting the process of having these units installed.
• We continue to work with the DAN Group, to improve issues with our “Legacy Fleet”. While some of the issues we are looking to resolve are not in the price point that most people would prefer, we are making attempts to determine solutions, so that owners can maintain their aircraft in a configuration suited to their required mission profile.
• With respect to all Garmin issues, as you can well imagine, Garmin and Diamond have a long history working in partnership. There are details of the certification process that are not known or understood by those not in the discussions and details. This is a long term project to maintain software, improve software, create new software, and certify and implement this software in the field. This process is by no means short, and we have to balance, along with Garmin, how these projects are incorporated, and how they affect current production aircraft , and Legacy Aircraft. It’s a delicate balance, to ensure we are meeting the needs of legacy issues, while still continuing our development of new production aircraft.
I appreciate your reaching out and hope you can understand that we are attempting to implement real change, not just a band-aide approach. It is not a quick fix and will take time to meet the overall Diamond support that I envision. That being said, we remain committing to fixing and improving this for all Diamond customers, both current and future.
Should you wish to discuss further, I can make myself available for a discussion.
Sincerely,
Scott McFadzean
Chief Executive Officer
Diamond Aircraft Industries Inc.
1560 Crumlin Sideroad ▪ London, Ontario ▪ Canada