"Dude" wrote in message
...


Also, Garmin has other competitors, but not many are doing nearly as well
in
the light airplane world. Avidyne is now their biggest competitor.

Yeah, except that when you consider that every Cirrus/Lancair ships with at
least a pair of 430's, it's not much of a competitor. It's as if every Chevy
truck shipped with a Ford engine. The Avidyne Entegra system may be nice to
fly behind but it is at least a generation behind the G1000, and will likely
continue to fall further behind as time goes by. If Avidyne can't do
something new and interesting within 2 years they're finished.

King,
Honeywell, and Chelton are coming after them as well. The guys doing
software for PC and Palm platforms are a threat. Microsoft could enter the
fray, and so could a few Japanese companies which would likely happen if
Toyota or Honda started building planes. So anyone thinking the UPS
acquisition should have been stopped has weak case in my mind.

As someone else mentioned, the market is not necessarily big enough. The
real strength of the G1000 is that it can be put into nearly any plane up to
light bizjets and perhaps beyond. This provides a base to spread the
development costs across.

I would love to see Toyota or Honda building planes, but then I used to
believe in the Easter Bunny too. Dunno about Toyota but I wouldn't be
shocked if we saw Honda enter the LSA market, given their experience with
ATVs, PWCs, and motorcycles. In any case, odds are whatever they build will
be proprietary to their planes and so not do the rest of us any good- kind
of like the G1000.

Best,
-cwk.