Paris Air Show 2013 Recap

The Paris Air Show 2013 is history – and it wrote (at least a little bit) of aviation history:

Embraer

On the opening day it was Embraer to launch it’s highly anticipated EJet E2 family. Not surprisingly, the E195-E2 will be a stretch of the current E195. Also no surprise that the E170 will not be continued and that the E190-E2 will stay where it is, sizewise. The E175-E2 will be a little bit larger in capacity, stretching it’s fuselage by 0.62m or 24.4inches. The effect is that two more seats can be fitted and in a 1-class 31” layout there are now 88 seats compared to 86 seats in the current E175. This is exactly the figure that Mitsubishi gives for the MRJ90 – any questions? With the same engine as the MRJ will get, the same cabin capacity and a new wing (even larger now than the MRJ wing) the fuel efficiency of the two aircraft should be very close to each other. The MTOW of the E175-E2 is a little bit higher (44.33 t vs. 42.8t), but the Embraer has more range, too (1920nm vs. 1780nm).

The E190-E2 will get long legs: 2800nm range, close the CS100. Fitted with the same geared turbofan engines it will have a lower capacity (106 seats vs. 115 seats in a single class 31” seating), but also lower weight, so we can expect similar economics. The E190-E2 will be some percentage points lower in trip costs, the CS100 some points better in costs per seat.

The E195-E2 will be a super-efficient aircraft for up to 2000nm, with lower trip costs than the CS300 and comparable seat mile costs  as the  13,000lbs. less MTOW mean , that for each of the 132 passengers in a single class 31” layout there is 3.7% MTOW than for the 140 passengers a CS300 can hold at 31” pitch. So if you don’t need 3000nm but just 2000nm range the E195-E2 should be the aircraft of your choice.

So Embraer started the Air Show with a splash and up to 365 orders for the new EJet family. I am sure there are more orders coming soon.

Bombardier

The CSeries on the other hand had no news in terms of orders (easyjet did not order this time, but said that the 150 seater replacement is too far out anyway, so they would discuss with Bombardier again once the time for replacing their last A319 comes nearer). Moreover, the week after, instead of having first flight of the CS100, Bombardier had to announce a further one month delay.

Boeing

Boeing wrote another piece of aviation history with launching the 787-10. Also no surprise here and the 100+ orders given at the Air Show are showing high confidence in the product. With 7.000nm range it covers 90% of the missions, Boeing says, so the question is if the anticipated B777-8 with just a little bit more capacity but 9.400nm range will find enough customers. The example of the B777-200LR (and A340-500) shows that the demand for routes that long is not that big. In the long run I expect that the B787-10 will be a better seller than the -8, maybe even better than the -9, even if sales numbers today are telling the opposite.

Airbus

Airbus had a reasonable good show – the only big surprise being the MoU for 20 A380 from Doric. This order could open up new customers for the aircraft type, as the risk for the operating airline is smaller than purchasing the aircraft, even when (as most airlines do) arranging a sale-and-leaseback immediately after purchase of the aircraft.

ATR

ATR received orders and commitments for 115 aircraft. NAC, the largest lessor of ATR aircraft gave firm orders for 30 ATR72-600 and 5 ATR42-600, ALC ordered 5 more ATR62-600 and HGI Capital Group, shareholder of Passaredo, ordered 10 ATR72-600 and holds options for 10 more.

Finnmecanica, parent company of Alenia, which is one of the 50% stakeholders in ATR, said that they would seek other partners for building a 90 seat turboprop if EADS does not commit by the end of the year. This will be an interesting thing to watch. On the one hand there are a lot of airlines asking for a 90 seat turboprop, on the other hand ATR’s order book is filled so good that they do not have any reason to invest money in a new product. Bombardier meanwhile has backed away from developing a 90 seat stretch of the Q400, saying they do not see the market big enough. The real reason could be that the company is too busy and financially burdened with the CSeries. And a simple stretch would probably not be good enough. ATR would develop a complete new 5 abreast aircraft. That would leave the possibility to stretch the fuselage to 110-120 seats later on.

Engines

I wrote a story about the A320eo engine battle ahead of the show. Not too many A320neo customers made(new)  announcements – the selection of the PW1100G by Norwegian for 50 of their A320neo’s was  announced last year. New announcements came from:

-          LATAM for the PW1100G for 42 A320neo

-          Spirit for the PW1100G for 45 A320neo

-          ACG for the PW1100G for 12 A320neo

-          ALC for the PW1100G for 30 of their 50 A320neo

-          ILFC for the PW1100G for 30 of their 50 new ordered A320neo

-          ILFC for the LEAP-1A    for 20 of their 50 new ordered A320neo

-          BOCA for the LEAP-1A for 10 of their 25 A320neo

The selection of the PW1100G by Spirit was a must-win for PW, as I wrote earlier. LATAM was (for me) an open campaign. The selection by ACG for 12 A320neo was also predicted as they had already selected the LEAP-1A for the other 18 aircraft. The selection by ALC shows that most lessors seem to prefer the GTF over the LEAP-1A, so I would predict that BOCA chooses the PW1100G for the remaining 15 A320neo. The only independent lessor that prefers the CFM engine so far is ACG – GECAS of course is a pure LEAP customer.