Those who are already interested and engaged – or want to become engaged – in recreational flying will love this new concept in adventure flying, the ICON A5, from ICON Aircraft. This re-imagined and redesigned aircraft is easy to fly, light in weight, and features relatively low costs to operate. What else makes the ICON A5 so special?
Unique Design
The most noticeable feature of the A5 is the absence of a front-mounted propeller. Instead, the propeller and entire engine are mounted behind the cockpit in a truly unique structural design. On top of that, the instrument panel within the cockpit is also lowered, which leaves pilot and passenger a breathtaking panoramic view of their surroundings. It’s a whole new way to look at the world.
The engine itself is a Rotax 912iS Sport, an electronically fuel-injected version of the Rotax 912. The benefit is greater efficiency and simpler operation for the user. It works with 100LL or 91 octane auto gasoline. Efficiency is further enhanced by the use of LED exterior lights that are less energy-consuming but also very bright with well-defined beams.
The ICON A5 also features folding wings for easier storage. The wings can be folded up in just 2 minutes by one person. Flying has never been so accessible! The aircraft is also available with the trademarked Seawings platforms to gain stability on water. That means the craft can be boarded both on land and from a dock. If the Seawings platform tips are damaged, replacement takes just minutes.
Safety Focus
ICON Aircraft mentions that the A5 has been carefully developed and rigorously tested over thousands of hours to create a truly spin-resistant frame. In fact, it’s the world’s first spin-resistant light sport aircraft.
With the frame steady, anyone can enjoy a better flight. If something unexpected does happen, the A5 is also loaded with the ICON Parachute System (IPS), which deploys an additional parachute to bring the plane back down to earth safely.
One more unique safety feature is the Angle of Attack (AoA) gauge. This small and seemingly innocuous gauge is actually among the most critical bits of information given to pilots on the instrument panel. The gauge is in easy line of sight for the pilot. It tells them at a glance how close the aircraft is to stalling. In other words, it tells the pilot in unambiguous terms when they might be pushing the aircraft too hard and therefore when to ease off.
Using the AoA gauge, pilots can quickly establish what in their flying repertoire can be achieved by the ICON A5, and what can’t. Even better, they get advance warning when a maneuver isn’t working, allowing them time to level out and restore equilibrium before any stalling happens.
Available Now
The ICON A5 is available in 2 main configurations with additional options:
- Amphibious Light Sport Aircraft (S-LSA) – from $359,000
- Certified Edition – from $399,000
Added extras include changes to exterior color, as well as upgraded avionics systems. The standard model is the Garmin aera 796, but it can be upgraded to the G3X touch with optional autopilot system. Discover how to get your ICON A5 by checking out the buying process today.
Startup
A startup or start-up is a company or project undertaken by an entrepreneur to seek, develop, and validate a scalable business model. While entrepreneurship refers to all new businesses, including self-employment and businesses that never intend to become registered, startups refer to new businesses that intend to grow large beyond the solo founder. At the beginning, startups face high uncertainty and have high rates of failure, but a minority of them do go on to be successful and influential. Some startups become unicorns; that is privately held startup companies valued at over US$1 billion.
Actions
Startups typically begin by a founder (solo-founder) or co-founders who have a way to solve a problem. The founder of a startup will begin market validation by problem interview, solution interview, and building a minimum viable product (MVP), i.e. a prototype, to develop and validate their business models. The startup process can take a long period of time (by some estimates, three years or longer), and hence sustaining effort is required. Over the long term, sustaining effort is especially challenging because of the high failure rates and uncertain outcomes. Having a business plan in place outlines what to do and how to plan and achieve an idea in the future. Typically, these plans outline the first 3 to 5 years of your business strategy.
Design principles
Models behind startups presenting as ventures are usually associated with design science. Design science uses design principles considered to be a coherent set of normative ideas and propositions to design and construct the company's backbone. For example, one of the initial design principles is "affordable loss".
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