Bjorn’s Corner: Asia-Pacific Air Traffic Management

By Bjorn FehrmJune 24 2016, ©. Leeham Co: Having covered the Air Traffic Management challenges in North America, Europe and Middle East we will now finish the series by looking at some specific problems affecting the Asia-Pacific region.

Asia-Pacific is the world region with the strongest growth in air traffic. IATA calculates that within 20 years half of the world’s air travel will originate or terminate within the region. Figure 1 shows that air traffic has several hot spots in Asia-Pacific, but also that there are areas with rather moderate traffic.

ATM in Asia Pacific 2016.06.23

Figure 1. Air traffic’s main routes in the world. Asia-Pacific is an area with large differences in air traffic intensity. Source: Rockwell Collins

The region has its unique set of Air Traffic Management problems. We will now cover those that must be solved, should the region’s Air Navigation Service Providers (ANSPs) be able to manage the forecasted growth in air travel in a safe way. Read more

Finnair exanding Far East faster than planned

By Bjorn Fehrm

May 26, 2016, ©. Leeham Co: Finnair could tell the participants on its Capital Markets Day yesterday that its Asia expansion plans are going better than planned. Being the Finnish national flag carrier, Finnair has had its slew of legacy airline problems, fighting the up-and-coming LCCs on its European network.

Figure 1. Finnair’s Airbus A350-900 taking off from Toulouse. Source: Airbus

After a restructuring period 2008 to 2012 to adjust costs, things have turned for the better. The company announced a revised strategic plan 2014, which would build on the strategic position of its hub, the Helsinki Vaanta airport, for traffic to the Far East.

Finnair CEO, Pekka Vauramo, could yesterday announce that this strategy is working better than planned.

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Irkut MC-21, first analysis

By Bjorn Fehrm

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Introduction

Feb. 08, 2016, © Leeham Co: We recently covered China’s COMAC C919 and now the time has come to the other new narrow body aircraft from the old Communist bloc, the Russian MC-21.

The aircraft is called Irkut MC-21. Not many have heard of Irkut, so the first reaction is that this aircraft is made by a new Russian aircraft firm. The change is that United Aircraft (the Russian aircraft industry holding company) this time called the aircraft after its manufacturing company and not the design bureau, Yakovlev, that Irkut acquired in 2004. There are discussions to change back to the project’s original name Yakovlev 242 once certification is done.

When we looked at the first civil airliner that the Russian federation designed after the fall of Soviet Union, the Sukhoi Superjet 100, we found a well designed aircraft equipped with Western system. The MC-21 follows the same lines, but has more Russian technological development. It is therefore well worth a look.

Summary:

  • The MC-21 has its own profile. It is not a copy of a Western aircraft. It has a wider cabin than the A320, a wing which allows a higher cruise speed and a higher capacity in its base variant, the MC-21-300.
  • To make a meaningful comparison between the MC-21 and established aircraft, we have chosen to compare the MC-21-200 with the Airbus A320neo, as the MC-21-300 is larger than the A320neo but smaller than an A321neo. The MC-21-200 is closer in size to an A320neo. Read more

The fuel effect; or old is beautiful

By Bjorn Fehrm

19 January 2016, ©. Leeham Co: When Willie Walsh, the CEO of IAG, said that the Airbus A340-600 “is a fantastic aircraft at fuel below $60 a barrel but perhaps not at $120,” he put operational words to something the Growth Frontiers 2016 conference in Dublin had been grappling with since it opened on Monday morning.

A340-600

What is going to happen now? Crude is falling below $30 a barrel and Jet fuel is below $1 a gallon. This must have an effect on how people decide, whatever the lessors and aircraft OEMs say.

And it had to be a senior airline CEO that broke the mantra that everyone was repeating: “We don’t see fuel prices having any effect on fleet planning for airlines.”

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Bjorn’s Corner: What did we learn in 2015?

By Bjorn Fehrm

By Bjorn Fehrm

08 January 2016, ©. Leeham Co: It’s the first Corner for the year and a look at 2015 as a year of technology advancements is due. 2015 will be remembered as the year when three clean sheet airliners passed important milestones. This will not happen for many years to come, so it will be worth to look at what they brought to world of aviation.

I’m thinking of Bombardier’s (BBD) CSeries getting certification for its first variant; the Mitsubishi MRJ doing its first flight’ and COMAC’s C919 being rolled out. Going forward, we will only have derivatives progressing through such milestones for years except for the roll-out of United Aircraft’s MS-21 single aisle airliner in 2016.

The Airbus A320neo was certified in 2015 and Boeing’s 737 MAX rolled out, but these are derivatives of in-service aircraft.

Embraer’s E-Jet E2 will roll out in February but this is a further development of today’s E-jet and Airbus A350-1000 is a variant of the in-service A350-900.

It will be a long time before we see so much new in a year, so it can be instructive to look at to what extent did these new aircraft bring the state of the art of airliners forward.

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State investment in Bombardier further mockery of WTO

Nov. 24, 2015, (c) Leeham Co. With the $1bn investment by the Province of Quebec in the Bombardier CSeries program, another example of government funding emerges in commercial aviation development.

Setting aside whether the investment might be challenged before the World Trade Organization—and whether this makes good business sense for Quebec—the move makes a mockery of the entire concept of avoiding government support.

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The turbo-prop conundrum: small market, high costs

ATR Turbo-prop. Photo via Google images.

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Introduction

ATR and Bombardier are incumbents. China has a home-market offering.

Indonesia and India want to create a product.

It’s the 60-seat and up turbo-prop market.

It’s too many companies chasing too-small a market.

Summary

  • The 20-year demand for 60-99 seat turbo-props is small.
  • Developing a new, clean-sheet design is costly.
  • There is a solid demand for an inexpensive 19-34 seat turbo-prop—but nobody is interested.

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Bjorn’s Corner: Aircraft systems, the real nuts to crack

By Bjorn Fehrm

By Bjorn Fehrm

06 November 2015, ©. Leeham Co: COMAC’s C919 was rolled out in the week. We got to see a new shiny aircraft which looked ready to fly. The nicely curved fuselage and wings were immaculate, the paint was shiny and the CFM LEAP-1C engines were ready to go.

Yet many ask, when will it fly for the first time? It used to be that when the airframe was finished and the engines ran reliably it was time to fly. No longer! Today the most challenging part of an aircraft program is the integration of all the complex systems which hide under the skin. This is what kept the Bombardier CSeries on ground longer than it should and the Boeing 787 and Airbus A380 had the same flu (the latter also had to short wires).

It is the part of the aircraft which takes longest to get to work reliably. The A380 is known for its long period of nuisance warnings from the complex avionics system after entry into service and the reliability work for the 787 has to a large extent been one of software tuning of its system side.

As the system function of modern aircraft has grown more complex the whole architecture of how it was built had to be changed. Here’s how.

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No fear of C919 for a generation

Nov. 4, 2015, © Leeham Co. The first COMAC C919 was rolled out of the factory over the weekend, China’s mainline entry into the fiercely competitive arena now “owned” by the Airbus-Boeing duopoly.

COMAC C919. Click on image to enlarge. Photo via Google images.

Although the two giants each has said China is the next competitor they will have to face, the Big Two have nothing to worry about for a generation to come.

Here’s why.

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ISTAT Europe 2015 in Prague: LCCs and Turkish airways take over Europe

By Bjorn Fehrm

06 October 2015, ©. Leeham Co: The global airline industry is on a steady course as a whole, but there are dramatic changes within Europe as low cost carriers, plus Turkish Airlines, redraw the competitive landscape.

China’s current economic softness raises concerns, with an independent analysis concluding that economic growth here is 2%-3% instead of the announced rate of 7%-8%.

Still, the mixed messages given at the annual ISTAT meeting in Europe this week didn’t put a damper on the mood of 1,200 delegates here in Prague.

  • The airlines are fine for 2015 as the fuel price is low but what about 2016? China is braking to a halt and Asia is getting infected? Will the infection spread? Will the airlines return to bad results?
  • What about the European airline industry? Can the low costs units of IAG, Lufthansa and Air France-KLM compete with the up-and-coming LCCs? Who is king of long haul travel out of Europe?
  • What about the order glut? When Asia slows, will the order bubble break?

 

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