Airbus, Boeing Run Neck-and-Neck in Splitting Air-Show Orders
A Boeing Co. 787 Dreamliner airplane during the Farnborough International Airshow. Photographer: Simon Dawson/Bloomberg
Airbus SAS and Boeing Co. enter the third day of the Farnborough Air Show today almost tied on new orders after racking up collective contracts for 243 jetliners with a value of more than $23 billion at list prices.
Boeing won 121 orders worth $11.6 billion after Steven Udvar-Hazy’s Air Lease Corp. bought 54 737-800 single-aisle aircraft yesterday. Airbus has sales agreements for 122 jets valued at $11.7 billion, excluding 50 A320s ordered by Chile’s LAN Airlines and subject to confirmation.
Boeing’s total omits three 787 Dreamliner planes bought by Royal Jordanian Airlines and 12 737-800 purchased by Dublin- based Avolon Leasing Group which had already been included in the U.S. company’s without the acquirers being disclosed.
Orders at this year’s Farnborough event stand at more than three times the 78 announced at last year’s Paris Air Show, with which the U.K. event alternates, and further commitments are likely today. The tally trails the 373 firm orders announced by Airbus and Boeing in Farnborough in 2008.
Boeing says it no longer hoards orders for air shows, and regards the events as useful for the level of contact with other manufacturers and airline customers.
Contracts from leasing companies continue to outstrip those from airlines, with Air Lease’s 737 deal taking its order total to 105 single-aisle models, including 51 A320s. The lessor also has options for six more 737s.
General Electric Co.’s GECAS unit has bought 100 planes, 60 of them Airbus narrow-bodies and the other 40 737s.
Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc’s leasing unit is also set to buy planes, two people familiar with the negotiations say.
Embraer Success
Empresa Brasileira de Aeronautica SA, the world’s fourth- largest planemaker, also won orders for 50 regional jets yesterday worth almost $1.9 billion at list prices, trumping larger competitor Bombardier Inc.
Flybe, Britain’s biggest domestic airline, added 35 88-seat Embraer 175 planes worth $1.3 billion, while Air Lease said it would buy 15 larger E190 jets valued at $600 million.
Including contracts announced yesterday, Embraer has won 55 orders at the Farnborough show, compared with 9 for Bombardier, which failed to unveil a new buyer for its CSeries jet at the event after a deal with Qatar Airways Ltd. hit a snag on issues concerning engine maker Pratt & Whitney.
To contact the reporters on this story: Andrea Rothman in Farnborough, England, via at aerothman@bloomberg.net; Susanna Ray in Farnborough, England, via sray7@bloomberg.net
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