Leeham News and Analysis
There's more to real news than a news release.
Leeham News and Analysis
- Bjorn’s Corner: Air Transport’s route to 2050. Part 27. June 20, 2025
- Pontifications: A Personal Note June 19, 2025
- Airbus books 142 firm orders as Boeing retracts from the Paris Air Show June 19, 2025
- AIN Media Group Agrees to Acquire Leeham News & Analysis June 17, 2025
- Five for Five: Air India crash points to systemic problems at Boeing that CEO Ortberg must fix June 15, 2025
Farnborough Air Show, July 15: VLA program analysis: A380, B747-8I, 777-9, [and the wishful thought of an A350-1100]
Fabrice Bregier, CEO of Airbus Commercial, threw cold water on the prospects of an A380neo and an A350-1100, the latter to compete with the Boeing 777-9.
Bregier’s position on the A350-1100 leaves Boeing with a monopoly at the 400-seat marker. Boeing doesn’t view the 777-9, which nominally seats 407 passengers, as part of the Very Large Aircraft sector which begins at 400 seats. Rather, Boeing lumps the -9 into the medium-twin aisle sector (300-400 seats).
While Airbus continues to struggle with sales for the A380, Boeing doesn’t much talk about the 747-8I anymore, focusing primarily on the future potential of the 747-8F. Boeing bravely talks about the prospect of four or five customer sales for the 747-8I this year, including a strong wishful-thinking of an order from Emirates Airlines (president Tim Clark says he’s not interested).
Farnborough Air Show, July 13: 737 program analysis
Michael O’Leary got his airplane.
Boeing today announced it will offer a 200-seat version of the 737-8, all but assuring that O’Leary, CEO of Ryanair, will become a customer of the MAX model. O’Leary has yet to order the MAX and has been pushing Boeing for some time to expand the capacity of the 737 to 199 passengers, one shy of the 200 that would require another flight attendant.
Just as Airbus previously announced revisions to the interiors of the A320 andA321 to push to 189 and 240 passengers respectively, Boeing had been studying similar changes.
Airbus, Boeing plan for production gap of A330, 777 with near-term availability claims
On the eve of the Farnborough Air Show, the aviation industry is watching to see whether Airbus will launch the A330neo program. Officials recently tried to tamp down expectations that a program launch will occur at the FAS, but we would not be surprised if an Authority to Offer is announced.
The industry will also be watching Boeing to see if some 200 commitments for the 777X announced at the Dubai Air Show will be firmed up at the FAS. We certainly expect this to be the case. (We also would not be surprised if there is a significant order for the Boeing 787-10.)
Questions will almost certainly arise once again about the production gaps for the Boeing 777 Classic and the A330ceo. Boeing faces a sharp drop in the backlog after 2016 and Airbus faces an even sharper fall-off after next year.
Near-term availability is an important element in Boeing’s plan to bridge the period between the in-production 777 and the entry-into-service of the 777X, says Randy Tinseth.
There are no AirbusA350 delivery slots of consequence available until 2019 and the 777 has plenty of slots starting in 2017, three years before the 777X EIS is planned.
But Airbus can make the same claim for the A330 vs the 787.
WA State continues to look Beyond Boeing to build aerospace industry
Washington State will continue to look “Beyond Boeing” while paying close attention to the giant aerospace company’s needs in order to further strengthen the state’s aerospace industry.
The annual update to the Washington State Aerospace Industry Strategy focuses on the state’s relationship with Boeing—something expected given Boeing’s overwhelming dominance to the Washington economy and workforce—but recognizes the need to attract aerospace business Beyond Boeing in order to diversify its reliance on Boeing.
The 38-page PDF may be downloaded here: 2014 WA State Aerospace Strategy
Odds and Ends: GAO report on ‘Boeing’s bank;’ C919; Airbus widebody strategy
GAO report on ‘Boeing’s bank:’ The US Government Accounting Office, a non-partisan investigating agency, completed a study of the funding and guarantees provided by the US ExIm Bank, which is under criticism from Congressional Republicans, and concluded non-US airlines do benefit from what amounts to subsidies.
These put US competitors at a disadvantage, GAO concludes. The full 29 page PDF may be found here.
The study period covered the global financial crisis, during which a good deal of private capital funding dried up. Airbus and Boeing each relied more heavily on export credit agencies for customer financing–ExIm in Boeing’s case and collectively European Credit Agencies, or ECAs, for Airbus.
The GAO found that ExIm funded or guaranteed financing for 789 Boeing wide body aircraft while the ECAs supported 821 Airbus wide-bodies.
Parenthetically, this statistic alone should demonstrate to Congress the need for ExIm to continue to be available for Boeing airplanes.
Airbus A330-800 and -900neo, first analysis
Airbus cleared the air about the A330neo, which we concluded was a must last December, and made the 2014 Farnborough Airshow go off to an exciting start. A lot has been speculated about the A330neo, and in the end it did come out a bit stronger than what most had anticipated. Some of that is marketing but a lot is real, and here we give a first assessment of what was launched.
Let’s start with the specifics as given by Airbus and Rolls-Royce today in presentations and discussions. Here are the A330-800neo and -900neo’s main features: Read more
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Posted on July 14, 2014 by Bjorn Fehrm
Airbus, Airlines, Boeing, EADS, Farnborough Air Show, Leeham News and Comment, Rolls-Royce, Uncategorized
777X, 787, A330, A330neo, A350, Airbus, Boeing, Rolls-Royce