ABOUT US
About us
OUR MISSION
NZ Aerosports was founded in 1986 with a simple objective: to provide skydivers with the experience of pure wild flight. This goal led founder Paul ‘Jyro’ Martyn on a journey to develop the world’s most comprehensive range of sports and high performance parachutes with the Icarus Canopies and Daedalus Project brands. NZ Aerosports is on a mission to provide pilots with the best flying experience one canopy after another. We are constantly working to bring you the best wings. We push the envelope. We innovate.


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Our Factory
The original NZ Aerosports factory at 46A Sussex Street is a piece of history. Scraped paint and graffiti hid a tiny gem in the heart of Auckland. The beer garden had countless parties, numerous skydiving greats visit and sign the door of fame, and was the birthplace of many of our greatest ideas. Production outgrew Sussex Street, and in September 2014 we moved into a new factory just up the road at Level 4, 137 Great North Rd. What was once office space was transformed into a factory full of plants, history and life. Our doors are always open, so if you find yourself in Auckland on your travels, come and visit us for a beer or five.
Founder
PAUL ‘Jyro’ MARTyn
Self-proclaimed omnipotent dictator Jyro was the life and soul of NZ Aerosports. He was a quirky, eccentric genius, with a scientific eye and an artistic, romantic heart. He passed away in 2017, but his legacy remains at the core of who NZ Aerosports is. His motto: don’t fuck up, have a phat time, be the best. We keep pushing hard like Jyro did – because as he would say, there’s fun to be had.
our People
Luci
Omnipotent Dictatoress
luci@nzaerosports.com
BatJen
Nocturnal Crime Fighter
jen@nzaerosports.com
Attila
Big Boss
info@nzaerosports.com
Matt
Sales Monkey
sales@nzaerosports.com
Julien
Scientific Parachute Maestro
julien@nzaerosports.com
Beedo
Dealer Sales Monkey
beedo@nzaerosports.com
Richie
Production Head Honcho
richie@nzaerosports.com
Yan
Canopy Fixer-Upperer
support@nzaerosports.com
Shan
Director of Awesomeness
marketing@nzaerosports.com
Te Aroha
Indispensable Shipping Co-ordinator
tearoha@nzaerosports.com
Maria
Digital Growth Geek
marketing@nzaerosports.com
Stewy
Ladies Man, Test Jumper & Video Editor
stewy@nzaerosports.com
Chris Brook
Senior Guinea Pig
chris@nzaerosports.com
Snelly
Production & Rigging Whiz
snelly@nzaerosports.com
Kamal
Production Supervisor
Lilia
Machinist
Kovi
Facility Development Manager
Samba
Machinist
Kathy
Machinist
Lynne
Machinist Training Manager
Renu
Machinist
Arlo
Parachute Rigger
Alex
Parachute Rigger
Helga
Machinist
Appy
Quality Controller
Vai
Machinist Supervisor
Ishani
People Person
Sammi
Machinist
Kate
Miss Money Bags
accounts@nzaerosports.com
Dan
Parachute Rigger
Maria
Robbie
Parachute Rigger
Donna
Machinist
Mali
Parachute Rigger
Pae
Machinist
Shawna
Machinist
Our History
Who’s Paul?
1980
1980
Who’s Paul?
Early 80s – Paul Martyn is a young man in love with skydiving, and completely broke. He starts to make log books, jump suits, and other gear – anything to fund his jumping. Along the way he picks up a nickname – JYRO for ‘Jump Your Ring Out’. No one really calls him Paul ever again.
1985
The beginning of something great
Jyro starts to make skydiving parachutes under the name “Icarus by JYRO” The first canopies were a few Pegasus copies for friends, then Jyro began gradually elevating the performance levels of the designs of the day.
ICARUS
1990
1990
ICARUS
In the early 90s Jyro changed the brand name to “Icarus Canopies” – and in ‘94 NZ Aerosports became an incorporated company.
Leading the change
1995
1995
Leading the change
In the late 80s PD brought out the Excalibur canopy showcasing a brand new construction method – the tri-brace (now ubiquitously known as ‘crossbraced’). Jyro knew that this was a big step forward, and wanted to combine this with another exciting new piece of technology – ZP fabric. Many, many prototypes followed, but while they flew hotter than ever, the openings weren’t good enough for the market. Jyro and the team just about went crazy and broke trying to make it work, but then…..
NZ Aerosports released the Mk 1 Icarus EXTreme in 1995, the first ZP crossbraced canopy on the market, and high performance canopies changed forever. In 1997, the upgraded FX (Fucking eXtreme) was released featuring the closed nose seen on all HP canopies these days. 2 Years later the PD Velocity was released based on the same format – the industry leader Jyro took inspiration from was now looking to him! Because he was a cheeky bastard, Jyro released the first crossbraced 9 cell – the VX – on the very same day.
Icarus World(wide)
1999
1999
Icarus World(wide)
In 1999 NZ Aerosports was growing in notoriety, and demand quickly outstripped Jyro and his small team’s capacity. In response, he signed licensing agreements with CIMSA in Spain, and Precision in the US – more people than ever were now able to jump Icarus Canopies! Precision later left and came out with their own versions of these designs.
2007
Last of the old school
After that there were upgrades and performance enhancements to our range, and Jyro developed and released the JFX and JVX, pushing the existing crossbraced designs even further. There hadn’t been anything groundbreaking for a while however…
2010
Summer of Love – Birth of the hyper-performance wing
In 2010, a young French skydiver with an aerospace engineer’s degree came to NZ for a holiday, visited the factory and – as happens more often than not – left with a job making linesets. It didn’t take long for Jyro to realise who he had, and Julien never made another lineset. Between Julien’s technical knowledge and high tech computational design processes, and Jyro’s passion for design and uncanny intuition for canopy characteristics, the infamous ‘Summer of Love’ prototyping fest was embarked on. This culminated in a wing leagues better than anything else being made at the time – Petra. Petra still holds all major Canopy Piloting records – fending off newer entrants to the ‘hyper performance’ market.
Going Solo
2016
2016
Going Solo
Following many years of dissatisfaction with the working agreement, an inability to collect royalties owed but not paid, and failed negotiations – in 2016 NZ Aerosports cancelled CIMSA’s licence to make, sell, or market Icarus canopies. NZ Aerosports is now the only place manufacturing true Icarus canopies. Of course, breakups often get messy, and CIMSA refused to drop the Icarus name, and released a new range of canopies with names that sound an awfully lot like Safire and Crossfire (we’re sure it’s unintentional). Cheeky bastards. Oh well!
A Legend signs off
2017
2017
A Legend signs off
Shortly after the 2017 PIA Symposium, Jyro passed away. It’s been incredibly hard on us as a company and individually – most of us considered him a close personal friend. We’re buoyed by the fact that he left a legacy of canopy design that’s worked its way throughout the market, and will last for a very very long time. Our job is to continue on in his footsteps and honour his legacy. Our mission statement is still JYRO’s: DON’T KILL ANYBODY. STAY OUT OF THE SHIT. HAVE A PHAT TIME. MAKE SOME MONEY. CONQUER THE WORLD.
2017-19
So WTF is happening with Icarus now?
After Jyro passed away, the company was handed to Luci, his daughter. The new shareholders are now Luci, Attila, Richie, and Julien. We work well as a team and continue to work towards Jyro’s vision and values, with adding our own spices to the mix.