3 hours ago, Farlis said:

Someday I want a development head give a TED Talk on a "How to start a Company that builds Add-On Aircraft".

I find it highly fascinating but can't wrap my head around how you can start with building such a high def aircraft from scratch, with nothing to your name, like Fenix did and Vector is doing now.

How does one set this up in a financially sound way that pays a team of 20+ people for years and covers development and research costs.

If a company who already has a business going does something like this, I can understand it, but starting from zero and then tackling an Airliner like this out of the gate? Fenix showed that it can be done, but how does one acquire a financial starter package that gets one going for something like this?

I might’ve missed something, but It seems most likely that this is all speculative personal time & savings investment.

It also bears consideration that some highly regarded addons have been developed by very small teams. E.g., the HotStart team who makes the TBM 900 & Challenger 650 (among others) appears to be but two people.

Black Square is similarly sized.

The BBS SR-71 was developed by and large by a single person.

And so on.

Once you get bigger, you can bring on hourly contractors, etc

Further, these addons are basically all “just” software projects, and there are quite a few talented coders out there.

And finally, I’d be willing to bet very few of the people involved are tyros in re flight simulation. E.g., the Sovereign team

Edited May 28May 28 by UrgentSiesta

Vector could well do for Boeings what Fenix did for Airbuses in flight simulation: raise the bar with a standout product, backed by a fresh new dev house.

Their initial announcement and release of info tidbits were interesting and got my attention, but this dev update definitely goes a long way in showing the level of depth they claimed initially. Looking forward to their future deep dives and release.

What a time for MSFS and the 3rd party aircraft scene so healthy and active!, with great birds being released or in the pipeline.. and the variety of aircraft be they GA or heavies.

I have a feeling that this 787-9 could turn out really good — really professional!
cheers 😉

Edited May 29May 29 by pmplayer

10 minutes ago, pmplayer said:

I have a feeling that this 787-9 could turn out really good — really professional!
cheers 😉

To enjoy it - you'll need to move to MSFS2024 😉

7 hours ago, abrams_tank said:

.......Vector is calculating that the market for MSFS is big enough, that they can earn a nice profit in the end, despite the fact that they have to pay for the salaries of their larger team.

If it turns out to be as good as we are all hoping, they should be swimming in money by the end of the year.

8 hours ago, ryanbatc said:

Ugh this is so boring, we need more Airbuses!

(This post brought to you by sarcasm)

With such sarcastic quips they’ll be moving you to the Tower at JFK !

7 hours ago, UrgentSiesta said:

It also bears consideration that some highly regarded addons have been developed by very small teams. E.g., the HotStart team who makes the TBM 900 & Challenger 650 (among others) appears to be but two people.

Black Square is similarly sized.

The BBS SR-71 was developed by and large by a single person.

And so on.

But these are small Aircraft. A Bonanza can easily be developed by a single person. But a 787, not so much. And then you need to be able to pay a team. And how do you do that? How do you convince a bank to a loan when you have no portfolio of previous add ons and a balance sheet to show how they have sold?

58 minutes ago, Farlis said:

How do you convince a bank to a loan when you have no portfolio of previous add ons and a balance sheet to show how they have sold?

Like in every venture, with a business case. Of course you need to talk to bank advisor who is acquainted with the leisure software market.

3 hours ago, Farlis said:

But these are small Aircraft. A Bonanza can easily be developed by a single person. But a 787, not so much. And then you need to be able to pay a team. And how do you do that? How do you convince a bank to a loan when you have no portfolio of previous add ons and a balance sheet to show how they have sold?

1. Project owner is already wealthy - doesn’t need a bank loan.

2. Team has day jobs and this is a side project.

3. Team is investing their free time today in the hopes of a big payoff tomorrow

4. A combination of the above which is all speculative

Edited May 29May 29 by Gilandred

@Gilandred nice root cause analysis in problem solving 😉Should be more or less Mutually Exclusive and Collectively Exhaustive.

5 hours ago, Farlis said:

But these are small Aircraft.

The Challenger C650 might be a small aircraft by size but I wouldn't consider it less complex from a software development standpoint than a 787, particularly when it offers a feature set that isn't yet fully offered by current airliner offerings and that's the engineering panels that let you view every miniscule aspect of the aircraft.

I especially don't think the SR-71 is no small feat to develop and mostly done by 1 person.

I think @UrgentSiesta put it rather succinctly, at the end of the day it's a software project (In laymen's terms).

At-least with developing planes you know exactly what you're target is, I want to make x plane, in the enterprise world, your customer often never really knows exactly what they want in their software.

13 hours ago, Farlis said:

But these are small Aircraft. A Bonanza can easily be developed by a single person. But a 787, not so much. And then you need to be able to pay a team. And how do you do that? How do you convince a bank to a loan when you have no portfolio of previous add ons and a balance sheet to show how they have sold?

I gave you several real world examples of small developer teams who have “somehow” been able to develop extremely complex simulations.

And your response is something along the lines of “Size Matters”…? Really???😂

The size of the aircraft matters not. It’s the sophistication thereof.

The Hot Start Challenger is incontrovertibly one of the most complex flight sim addons ever created. And it recreates an IRL aircraft that is every bit as complex as any tubeliner out there.

In re Black Square, look into their Starship. Full custom avionics of a globally capable pre-GPS IFR aircraft, along with deeply simulated…everything else

Nick, the lead developer, has asserted that he believes it’s every bit as complex (as an addon) as the HS Challenger.

And if you somehow think that BBS just copied and pasted the Dark Star code to make their SR-71, you’ve definitely got another think coming!!!

Oh, and didja know an SR-71 is right around the same size and operating weight of a 737…?

An example from yet another sim is the DCS F-15E Strike Eagle. A study level addon with incredibly detailed sensors, avionics, targeting, and other modern systems. Definitely peer level to any tubeliner in terms of coding effort

All developed by a team of three-ish. Two-ish of whom were independent sub-contractors.

And I bring that one up because we know for a fact that they did all that work for ZERO up front pay.

Finally, look into the early days of Working Title and Fly By Wire. These shops never even set out to go commercial…

Edited Friday at 09:20 PM5 days by UrgentSiesta

21 hours ago, abrams_tank said:

Choosing the rignt simulator to develop for matters a lot. Like if Vector decided to do this project on P3D or XP, they would probably lose a lot of money. Vector is calculating that the market for MSFS is big enough, that they can earn a nice profit in the end, despite the fact that they have to pay for the salaries of their larger team.

Why are you forgetting about Flight Factor and ToLiss and Hot Start and…?

Awesome I look forward to this release! I used WT's 787X mod for a long time and enjoyed what it could do but to get a fully developed version will be fabulous!

9 hours ago, UrgentSiesta said:

In re Black Square, look into their Starship. Full custom avionics of a globally capable pre-GPS IFR aircraft, along with deeply simulated…everything else

Black Square however started small and based their first aircraft on work already done by Asobo. And only after having sold a copious amount of what was basically a modded version of someone elses work the developer went to produce aircraft from scratch.

It's not like he started with the Starship or the Professional Versions of the Beechcrafts.

So he did not simply materialze these out of thin air, like Vector is doing here.

Edited Saturday at 07:15 AM5 days by Farlis