Dubai's involvement in light business jet comes to a sorry end

Emivest - which is believed to me more than a quarter owned by the Dubai government - paid what was described as a "substantial sum" in 2008 for the rights to the Ed Swearingen designed aircraft which was formerly known as the Sino-Swearingen SJ30 because it was previously owned by a Taiwanese government investment business.

The apparent backlog for the $7.25 million Williams International-powered twinjet at the time was more than 300 orders including one for Hollywood star Morgan Freeman. Howeveronly Freeman's and one other have been delivered.. Indeed only four aircraft have been built and delivered to date, two by Sino-Swearingen and two by Emivest before Emivest declared Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in October 2010.

A US  court decision has now called for the bidder, Metalcraft, to pay $3.5 million in cash for the assets, which includes manufacturing equipment and facilities in West Virginia and Texas, and $1.69 million in assumed liabilities "relating to SJ30  aircraft serial number 12". Court papers show that it has 120 days to get the equipment out of the two facilities.
 
Earlier this year China Aviation Industry General Aircraft (CAIGA), was beleived to be committing to invest up to $100 million in reestablishing the SJ30. But a bid never arrived. CAIGA did buy Cirrus Aircraft from a Bahrain investment house althouggh it is still awaiting formal government approvals on its offer to buy teh full 100% stake.

Pictured: Inside the SJ30 - now ownership is with Utah firm