Leeham News and Analysis
There's more to real news than a news release.
Airbus Group 2015 results: A330 increase to seven per month
By Bjorn Fehrm
24 February 2016, ©. Leeham Co: Airbus will increase the production rate of the A330
from six per month to seven beginning next year, it was announced today. The move comes after reducing the rate from 10 to nine and then to six per month as demand fell for the A330ceo ahead of the development of the A330neo.
Strong sales of the ceo resulted in the about-face to increase the rate.
The news came from the Airbus Group financial results for full year 2015 today in London.
In all other aspects it was a year of solid execution with revenue up 6% to €64.5bn. Profits stayed flat at €4bn despite record deliveries; the A350 and A400M ramp-ups are costly exercises.
Other highlights were;
Air Canada orders up to 75 C Series; announced with BBD 2015 financial results
Feb. 17, 2016: The long drought is over.
Air Canada has ordered up to 75 Bombardier C Series.The press conference is at 11am EST today. These will replace 25 Embraer E-190s. BBD now has orders and commitments for 678 C Series.
The announcement comes with the company’s fourth quarter and year-end financial results and a 90-seat version of its Q400 turboprop.
The Air Canada deal is a Letter of Intent for 45 CS300s and options for 30 more, including conversion rights to CS100s. Deliveries are from 2019.
- BBD to cut 7,000 jobs: Bloomberg News. The cut includes 2,000 contractors.
The earnings call webcast summary is below the jump.
PNAA Day 2: Cautionary note raised
- Feb. 10, 2016: Today is the second of three days of conference meetings organized by
the Pacific Northwest Aerospace Alliance (PNAA), in Lynnwood (WA). We’re providing live reporting throughout the three days.
Feb. 10, 2016: Large commercial aircraft deliveries hit just under $104bn in 2015, a 4.9% gain over 2014. Regional aircraft values, however, were just $7.1bn, a decline of 10.5% year-over-year, said Richard Aboulafia, a consultant with the Teal Group.
Deliveries of all aircraft types, including military, rotocraft, etc., saw only a 0.6% increase YOY. Jetliners account for 60% of the total values.
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
Analysis: Sukhoi’s regional jet Superjet 100
By Bjorn Fehrm
Subscription required
Introduction
18 January 2016, © Leeham Co: Russian aircraft have never succeeded in penetrating the Western market. But then they never really tried, until now. They were designed for the Soviet Union captive market, including the partner states that historically participated in or were friendly to the communistic system. One comes to think of China, Egypt, Libya, Cuba and Nicaragua.
The Sukhoi Civil Aircraft Company (SCAC) Superjet 100 (SSJ100) is the first Russian aircraft specifically designed from the outset to compete on a world market.
We analyse its basic design and performance in comparison to the market leader in 100 seat regional flying, Embraer’s E190.
Summary:
- The SSJ100 is a half a generation younger design than the Embraer E190. It has modern aerodynamics, IMA-based modular avionics and an advanced Fly-By-Wire system.
- The feedback-based Fly-By-Wire enables a tight aircraft design with low wetted areas.
- The SSJ100 engines, SaM146, can best be described as a shrinked and cleaned up CFM56. They have the efficiency level of the E190’s CF34-10E.
- The aerodynamics and engines combine to give the SSJ100 a single digit edge in fuel burn over the E190.
Bjorn’s Corner: What did we learn in 2015; engines
By Bjorn Fehrm
15 January 2016, ©. Leeham Co: Last week we looked back on what happened in 2015 on the airframe front. We finish the retrospective by looking at what turbofan engine technology came to market in 2015. New engine technology is vital, as it is on the engine side that the quest for higher fuel efficiency has the largest successes.
While advances on the airframe side might bring an additional 5% per generation, the engines typically increase their efficiency per new generation with up to three times that value. Fuel efficiency per delivered thrust unit was improved with a whopping 15% over the engine it replaces for the Pratt & Whitney Geared Turbofan (PW GTF). It was certified for use on the Airbus A320neo in Q4 2015
The competing CFM LEAP-1A shall deliver the same improvement level to the A320neo once it is certified in the summer of this year. This engine has a smaller sister that started ground tests last year, the LEAP-1B, which is developed for the Boeing 737 MAX series.
The engine that is easily forgotten is the Rolls Royce Trent XWB. It entered service on the Airbus A350-900 during the year. It brings an improvement level of around 10% compared to the engines of the aircraft that the A350 replaces (Airbus A340/A330ceo and Boeing’s 777-200 range).
Airbus annual press conference 2016
By Bjorn Fehrm
Introduction
12 January 2016, ©. Leeham Co: Airbus held its annual press conference in Paris today against a backdrop of record 2015 deliveries. The year that went past was consequently a good one for Airbus. Orders were at a record high for the third year in succession and deliveries exceeded previous years for the 13th year in succession.
But the Airbus sky wasn’t totally cloud free; the large A380 only got sales by having ANA mop up the mess after Japan’s Skymark bankruptcy and production of the new A350 was hindered by a sole source lavatory supplier.
The result was that Airbus missed two 2015 delivery targets, the 15 per year for A350 (delivered 14) and the 2016 delivery of the first A320neo. The latter was because of “paperwork issues” related to certain things being “late to finish” ahead of certification. Read more
Bjorn’s Corner: What did we learn in 2015?
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.
How good is a used 767-300ER? Part 4
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By Bjorn Fehrm
Introduction
Jan. 6 2016, ©. Leeham Co: We now finish our series of acquiring a used Boeing 767 aircraft to upgrade a Boeing 757-based long haul service. The 767 went out of favor recently as it has higher fuel consumption per seat than competing aircraft like Airbus A330-200.
With today’s low fuel prices and favorable used prices, a well kept 767-300ER is once again an interesting long haul aircraft. In previous articles, we looked at different aspects of the 767-300ER compared with the A330-200. First we compared the aircraft’s characteristics (Part one), then Cash Operating Costs (Part two) and finally Direct Operating Costs (Part three).
We now finish the series with a revenue and margin analysis. First we establish the competitor’s payload carrying capabilities over a trans-Atlantic network. Then we calculate their revenue capabilities using standard yields (revenue per load unit). The revenue and cost data then gives us the operating margins for the aircraft.
Summary
- The 757 has the lowest costs but is considerably more limited in its payload and range capability than the 767 and A330. Its lack in capacity is augmented by a lack of cargo handling facilities.
- The 767 has a cargo handling concept, unfortunately with the wrong container standard, LD2. The alternative is pallet based freight, which works well for the 767.
- The A330-200 has the best passenger and cargo transporting capability. This compensates for its higher Direct Operating Costs but the low fuel prices keeps the 767 in the hunt.