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Hey, I have a few ForeFlight questions for you: First, do you buy all the approach plates or just the ones you fly? Same with NOTAMs? Secondly, what features are missing from the ad-based free-tier subscription versus the paid one? Oh, and finally, what are all the forms of payment ForeFlight takes for in-app purchases? I’m hoping to buy some airport NFTs soon.
You caught me. I made all that stuff up. But, with the recent sale of ForeFlight to the private equity firm Thoma Bravo, did I?
Inevitability
I don’t think I have to convince you that the last few years have not been kind to everyone’s favorite “Arlington-based” aerospace firm. From the MCAS debacle to various quality control issues to the recent machinist strike that cost the company an estimated $5 billion, Boeing has seen better days (putting it mildly). Consequently, the firm has been signaling the sale of its non-core assets for quite some time in order to pay off its accruing debt.
When this news was first reported by Bloomberg, only Jeppesen was mentioned. However, it was clear to most analysts that Boeing’s entire Digital Aviation Solutions unit was up for grabs—which, of course, included ForeFlight.
How Did We Get Here?
ForeFlight started as an independent software company back in 2007, founded by two active pilots, Tyson Weihs and Jason Miller (no, not The Finer Points guy), who were both witnessing firsthand the iPhone revolution and wanted to develop a connected cockpit around it. Within a decade, ForeFlight had grown from a two-person startup with a nifty weather-planning app to an enterprise cloud-backed platform employing over a hundred people worldwide. ForeFlight didn’t invent the concept of the EFB, but it certainly became the gold standard—an indispensable tool used by both GA and airline pilots alike.
Fast forward to 2019, and Boeing’s acquisition seemed like a win-win. The airliner manufacturer already owned the charting company Jeppesen, and combining the two under their digital services umbrella seemed natural.
Unfortunately, it was also the beginning of Boeing’s fall from grace with the 737 MAX accidents (and the subsequent grounding of the fleet), which ultimately led to the CEO resigning and new management being brought in. With it also came a new refocus on their airliner and defense businesses—leaving units like ForeFlight increasingly sidelined.
Not That Bravo
Thoma Bravo is a very large private equity firm that specializes in buying software companies. Their portfolio includes SolarWinds, McAfee, and Dynatrace to name a few (bonus points if you recognize the other two). Like most private equity firms, they specialize in both growth buyouts and consolidation ones. A growth buyout is when a private equity firm sees untapped revenue in an existing business not realized due to lack of capital, which they can provide in spades. A consolidation buyout is where they plan to revitalize a legacy business through some kind of restructuring (or not—remember K-Mart?). Which one does the ForeFlight acquisition fall under? Great question.
Hold For Release
Does all this spell the end of ForeFlight? I don’t think so. ForeFlight is still considered the EFB standard with a very loyal user base—it’s their market share to lose. However, I also don’t think their future is entirely CAVOK either: In the 25-plus years I’ve been in the software business, I have never met a private equity deal I liked. Mainly because private equity’s primary (only?) focus is maximizing ROI, usually at the expense of innovation, while with traditional corporate ownership it tends to be the other way around. Think homeowner versus home flipper: both invest in the property but with very different goals in mind.
A few key questions:
- Will their subscription-based pricing model change significantly?
- Will there be any service disruptions? (yeah, I know what they said)
- How will they react to disruptive technologies such as Starlink?
- How will their product roadmap change as a result?
- What about partner integrations and services like CloudAhoy?
What if Thoma Bravo is not ForeFlight’s final destination?
Here’s more food for thought: What if Thoma Bravo is not ForeFlight’s final destination? I have seen private equity firms buy a company with a wide range of products with their eye on just a single prize (in some cases, it’s not even the products themselves but the patents on which they are based). In other words, ForeFlight may be just coming along for the ride, then spun out, consolidated, or sold off at a later date. Your guess is as good as mine, but the recent statements Thoma Bravo reps have made about the acquisition have been mainly about Jeppesen. Fascinating.
The flip side: if Boeing was not in a position or just unwilling to invest in ForeFlight, then private equity sponsorship is better than a business starving for resources. Moreover, if ForeFlight is given complete autonomy as a company, this could in fact be a boon to rapid growth—there are certainly successful private equity-backed software companies.
Finally, it will be very interesting to see not only how ForeFlight evolves but also its competitors. It would not shock me, for instance, if Garmin started to heavily discount Pilot as the proverbial olive branch to get pilots to switch. I’m also of the belief that the entire EFB sector will transform radically once in-flight Internet connectivity becomes a reliable reality.
The bottom line: if you are a ForeFlight pilot, I think in the short term, everything is business as usual. However, the stigma of private equity does cast a small shadow going forward. Mergers and acquisitions are always complicated processes with a lot of unexpected surprises, no matter how hard the buyer (or seller) does their due diligence. Only time will tell. Stay tuned.
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I’ve worked for a company that ThomaBravo purchased and resold. They took our founder-owned, debt free company and leveraged us 2x annual revenue, paid themselves back and sold the company off as a package deal to another set of private equity firms. It’s sad for the employees and the customers. I don’t hold out much hope, but I’ve always loved the ForeFlight product.
I feel your pain. I really do. I was talking to a good friend and local CFI who has a background in finance. When I told him the news, his immediate reaction was as if the family dog died. He then looked over at my iPad, and said, “So, how do you like Garmin Pilot?”
The poll results are interesting—lots of negativity about the deal. And the first comment is ominous. I hope it won’t all be that bad.
FF will end up somewhere. VC doesn’t buy and hold more than 5 years. I call phase FF is in now the Mr Potatohead phase…a bunch of things will be stuck together, a price tag eventually affixed and then sold off…in the meantime product performance will not be a high priority other than what it takes to keep customer base on onboard.
Much of the unpleasantness for staff probably already occurred during the Boeing acquisition, those that had a piece of the action likely rode off into the sunset, the rest probably wondered what happened and many formerly trivial day to day decisions were now all pending corporate input or “process”.
Just part of the normal lifecycle…
I have to say doing some research I’m very worried. Hearing from other people who experience a buyout from this company and reading what’s in the article about how they feel they can capitalize more only comes from one thing…. Generating more profits from the people. So prices will go up. When they’re done with the company they do what they do and sell it off…
Honestly I was with Foreflight for a little while… now i is iFly EFB… AND I WON’T GO BACK!, especially now! I love their product and it’s CustomerService is second to none. You call them you get a person.
This saddens me but this is what happens when big companies put out big products…. If it comes all about the money and no passion for the product.
I’m only a pilot of 5 years. I compared Garmin pilot to foreflight and went with the latter simply because the experience was more intuitive. I hope and pray FF stays the way it is with continued growth, but I agree with this author. Private equity usually equates to destruction. This would be a very ripe time for Garmin to get their heads out of there you know what, and make their product more user intuitive. I already think their their weather maps are better. It’s just too many steps to make a flight plan and then if you want to alter it, I get dizzy.
I use FF every day even though I’m not flying everyday. I use it for weather.
I hope they survive this purchase.
ForeFlight, since earring my private in 2010, opened up a whole new world for me as an incredible flight tool. I have met the original owners and was always pulling for them, amazed by their innovation. I believe FF was born from a personal negative experience one of the owners experienced. I hope they are both doing well now and happily flying wherever their hearts desire. From this article, I agree that Mr, Sacks opening statement has a ring of truth to it. I will wait and see how ForeFlight innovates going forward. I have always felt it brought me into the 21st century from the analog tools I had when learning. But from what little I know about ThomaBravo, it seems the future is not as bright for my favorite partner in the cockpit.
Excellent insight and thoughts. While this is another “We shall see” moment for the FF team and product, I’ve never met or experienced a PE deal that was fun, nor painless to the employees, or a good deal for the customer. We are flying into IMC folks. You are correct in the statement they are interested in ROI. Although I’ll restate this as the PE is only interested in increasing ROI (Revenue). They need to gain altitude to give returns to their investors. There’s two ways to accomplish this; 1) Dump fuel to lighten the load – Eliminate spend (terminate staff – especially at the top), and 2) Throttle forward with more fuel burn – Increase the cost to the consumer. Sometimes one of these. Sometimes both. Then once at desired clear, smooth, favorable altitude, you maximize airspeed to get to your destination – show very positive numbers and you sell at a fat margin to bring maximum benefit to your investors. The other option is if FF is already producing reasonable margin (profit) (no idea how they are doing financially other than they get a couple hundred gallons of fuel from my tank) to keep your investors happy — it could be a good thing for the consumer. Lighten the staffing load, invest in innovation, keep pricing same so not to scare off clients (us) to the competition, and make FF an even better product. Not a bad idea to plan for nearby airfields (other tools) to divert if the FF weather goes non-VFR. We shall see.
I’m jealous Roger! Those analogies are fantastic!
It truly is fling on blind faith for the moment. If I were to guess they have an audience of one already picked out for a potentially quick sale to Garmin. In many ways that could be our best outcome. Remember, the NEXRAD lag time on this one definitely doesn’t allow for tactical penetration so slow down to Vo and hold on!
If you want to get a glimpse of what could be the future, go see what a private equity group did with FlyQ…Totally screwed over the loyal user base and reneged on previous commitments..
Yep. I was quite happy with FlyQ and had a lifetime subscription. It was and is exceedingly easy to navigate the app, but their PE takeover was very turbulent. If I had to revert to an annual subscription basis, Garmin Pilot was going to be my EFB of choice since most of my panel is Garmin already. FlyQ stopped the bleeding on their third iteration for us lifetime subscribers by making their app updates & data stay live, but not adding future upgrades without an annual subscription. I’m OK with that, as I like the app as it is. However, Garmin Pilot could still be in my future, we’ll just have to see.
FF is very reasonably priced. It’s used by pretty much every pilot out there, including government and military. 100% this new company seems untapped revenue in military and government contracts.
Buyouts like this never result in anything good. The price is going to go up, probably significantly. They’ll do away with the yearly subscription option and only allow monthly. App development will be neglected, and new features will be non-existent within a couple of years, because app development costs money.
I absolutely see this new company trying to milk out every cent then can out of FF, hoping people will continue to pay for it based on its legacy, all while putting absolutely zero effort in to making it a better product or keeping it running smoothly.
Just a clarifying point since some commenters seem to confuse VC (venture capital) and PE (private equity). Venture capital is generally a good thing as people are throwing money at an idea hoping to strike it rich; private equity is generally not great for innovation and instead a way for big companies to continue printing money off an existing product without investing much into it.
I passed my PPL check ride almost a year ago. I wanted to use iFly EFB. My club had a Sentry GPS, which only works with Foreflight. All those people who bought Sentries are stuck if FF goes south.
McAfee? All you need to know.
Truthfully, I wanted Garmin Pilot but had to go with Foreflight for the short term. The aircraft I’ll be flying all use Garmin and I never liked the Foreflight price and lack of occasional discounts. It works well but I really liked Garmin better.
I have Avidyne navigators in the panel that only use Jeppeson nav data so I am doubly hosed if this acquisition goes sideways. I have no clear path on what to do or where to go if either FF or Jepps get too expensive or even eroding in capability. The FARs require me to only use current data. My checkbook has a big say in that and what’s happening in the cost of flying lately not to mention the cost of living that I am sure everyone else has this top of mind as well.
Bob, are you sure the navigation database is powered by Jepp? Source: https://www.avidyne.com/databases
I’m pretty sure T-Bravo wanted Jeppesen more than FF. They seem like a great cash cow. Again, time will tell.
Yes, Avidyne definitely uses Jepp data. I think the docs you linked to pertain to Avidyne’s formatting of Jepp’s data for their devices.
Then I say, “Gulp!”