A320neo vs. B737MAX market share

At last week's PNAA conference there was one more time the may be never-ending discussion about how Airbus and Boeing will split their market share in the narrowbody market (there is no talk about how Bombardier will be doing with the CSeries, but this is would be a complete different - and at the moment quite sad - story).
This discussion was initiated by Richard Aboulafia, who predicted a 60% market share for the A320neo. Boeing's VP Marketing Randy Tinseth soon dismissed that, saying that he believes Boeing will have a 50% market share with the B737MAX (and he would do a bad job if he would not do so, of course).

After Airbus Press Conference: Rate Increase and LEAP-1A delay?

Airbus today announced their final 2014 orders and delivery results. Beside a new delivery record there is one noticable item that begs two questions: the increasing backlog of the A320ceo shouts and screams for a (very) near term announcement of a rate increase, which was probably decided some months ago. Also, it puts into question if the CFM LEAP-1A, the second engine for the A320neo, will be available on time. The PW1100G seems to be "out of the woods", getting certification late last year and Airbus CEO Bregier during the Investors Days in December said that he expects the first delivery of the A320neo in November 2015.
The backlog for the A320ceo stands now at 1508. This is 38 more than at the end of November, which I analyzed here. Subtracting all 102 "suspicious" orders gets us to 1406 open orders. The still not booked order from CASGC would lead us then to 1476 open orders for about 1164 delivery positions until 2018. So Airbus overbooked the A320ceo lines by 250 aircraft at current production rates.
Now, as I said above, I think a rate increase is coming for sure. For one to clear the A320ceo backlog as soon as possible, but also to be able to offer earlier production slots in upcoming campaigns.
As for the overbooking of the A320ceo, there could also be another reason: the LEAP-1A has still not flown on the GE Flying Testbed. At the time the LEAP-1C began the test campaign on the other GE testbed in early October CFM said that the -1A would follow within a month. Now we are two months later...maybe something was found during the -1C test campaign that needed a change for both variants?

A320ceo and B737NG backlogs

As I wrote briefly last week, it looks like Airbus is increasingly overbooking the A320ceo. But what does "overbooking" mean? Well, I always compare the remaining backlog to what I think was the

Airbus A320ceo overbooking

Today the Airbus Order & Deliveries spreadsheet for November 2014 was published. There are 89 new orders for the A320ceo family (the most from unidentified customers and my feeling is that these are chinese airlines). There is also the cancellation of 10 A321ceo's from Jetblue - they are taking 10 more A321neo instead. So there are 79 more net orders for the A320ceo line, which was heavily overbooked even before these new orders. I will do a deeper analysis next week, also including the situation for the B737NG.

New competition in Large Cabin Bizjet Segment

Yesterday Gulfstream announced their two new aircraft offerings in the Large Cabin segment, the G500 and the G600, powered with PW800 engines from P&WC. A very good summary of what these look like and what they can may be found in a long article from Aviation Week.
These aircraft borrow a lot of technology from the top-of-the-line G650(ER). In some cases, they top the G650, for example in the cockpit design.
Although Gulfstream says that these two new aircraft are additions to their product line and are not intended to replace the G450 and G550, I believe at least the days of the G450 are counted. If you read that the G500 will carry less fuel than the G450, but the G500 will fly 5000nm at M0.85, whereas the G450 flies 4220nm at M0.8. Moreover, the G500 has a cabin that is 2.5ft longer and 7 inches wider, providing a higher pressure in flight, making traveling more comfortable. Also, noise will be less, both out- and inside.
So I would not be surprised to see a run on these models comparable to the G650 when this aircraft was first announced. Production slots were sold every minute back then.
What will be the reaction from Bombardier. The G500 and G600 are clearly aiming at the Global5000 and Global 6000. We get a few hints when we search the Internet for the term "BR700NG": for example take a look here: GE is not the only one going for high tech ceramics in a business jet engine (the Passport 20 in this case). RR will also incorporate parts from this material in their BR700NG. And I am sure that

• the BR700NG will be the engine for an update of the Global 5000/6000
• that this update will be announced at the NBAA in Orlando next week

So what is Airbus vs. Boeing in the commercial aircraft arena is Bombardier vs. Gulfstream in the bizjet arena (with more than a little bit of noise from Dassault although).