In a statement filed to the Hong Kong stock exchange, the carrier said the cost would be “payable by cash in installments” and it would “take delivery of the Boeing Aircraft in stages from 2013 to 2015.”
“The aircraft price is subject to price escalation by applying a formula. Boeing Company has granted to the Company (Air China) significant price concessions with regard to the Boeing Aircraft,” said the statement.
The transaction will be funded through cash generated from Air China’s business operations, commercial bank loans and other financing instruments of Air China, said the statement.
The Beijing-based airlines said the transaction would expand its fleet capacity with an increase of around 5 percent based on available tonne kilometers of Air China by the end of 2009.
In particular, the deal would reinforce Air China’s market share in the Chinese domestic market, and would also increase frequency of flights for a number of domestic and neighboring international routes, it added. – read more at ChinaDaily.com…
Boeing's new 787 will be a big seller in China
James McNerney Jr, chairman, president and CEO of the Boeing company, made the statement at a luncheon organized by The Chicago Council On Global Affairs as part of its Corporate Program: Focus on China.
McNerney started his speech by commending Secretary of State Hilary Clinton and Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner for the progress their teams made this week at the Sino-US Strategic and Economic Dialogue in Beijing.
“It is vitally important that US leaders are engaged in supporting US trade relationships. Expanded engagement in international markets, combined with the recovery of our financial service markets, is critical to accelerating our overall economic recovery,” he said.
In 1972, then President Richard Nixon landed in Beijing aboard Air Force One – a Boeing 707 – marking the first visit of a US president to China. Boeing has been one of the few American companies present in China since diplomatic and economic channels were reopened.
“That Boeing 707 is truly the game-changing airplane of its time. China ordered ten Boeing 707 jetliners soon after the visit, setting in motion a tremendously productive relationship between a company (Boeing) and a country (China) – a relationship that continues today and in many ways has become symbolic of the four decades of cooperation between our two nations,” McNerney said.
When talking about the significant changes in China, McNerney said, “One of the most important changes in China that I have witnessed – the rapid growth in personal incomes. A growing middle class in China is dramatically reshaping the country’ s domestic economy and has global economic impact too.”
Regarding Boeing’s growing business with China, the CEO exclaimed, “China has bought more than any country in the world (except the US). It has a total of 1,560 airplanes (almost 53 percent of them are Boeing airplanes), and the average age of these planes is just six and a half years – meaning that China also has one of the youngest fleets in the region.”
Commenting on the relationship between China and the United States, he noted, “I believe the US and China are already interdependent and growing more so every day. In fact, our interdependence with China is key to the US achieving President Obama’ s goal of doubling America’s exports over the next five years – an increase projected to support two million American jobs at a time when we really need them.”
“I expect that the US-China relationship will always be complex, but that global interdependence in business will help keep both nations motivated to work out their differences constructively,” he added. – read more at ChinaDaily.com…
Scheduled to fly in 2016, the COMAC C919 will be China's first large commercial jetliner.
A source close to the deal told China Daily that Hamilton Sundstrand will form a joint-venture partnership with Aviation Industry Corporation of China (AVIC) System Co Ltd to develop and manufacture the electrical system, as stated in a letter of intent signed on April 15 in Xi’an, Shaanxi province.
The C919, China’s first large commercial jetliner developed by the Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China Ltd (COMAC), is expected to take flight in 2016.
Shanghai-based COMAC aims to sell more than 2,000 of the 150-seat single-aisle planes over the next 20 years, challenging Airbus and Boeing in both the domestic and global markets.
Hamilton Sundstrand, a subsidiary of United Technologies Corp, estimated in a statement on its website that the deal would be worth more than $1 billion in revenue over the life of the program.
“Hamilton Sundstrand is honored to partner with COMAC to provide the electric system on the new C919 aircraft,” said Hamilton Sundstrand President Alain Bellemare.
“With this agreement, Hamilton Sundstrand continues to play a large role in the Chinese aviation industry’s rapid growth.”
The contract is expected to contribute to United Technologies Corp’s estimated 2010 earnings of between $54 billion and $55 billion for 2010.
United Technologies Corp, which also makes Pratt & Whitney jet engines and Sikorsky helicopters, said on Wednesday its first quarter profit jumped 20 percent, the first increase in a year as the industrial conglomerate cited its efforts to cut costs and boost productivity.
United Technologies rose $2.73, or 3.7 percent, to $76.93 in New York Stock Exchange trading on Wednesday.
Hamilton Sundstrand is a key supplier on COMAC’s 90-seat ARJ21 regional jet, including the electric power, high-lift actuation and fire protection systems. — read more at People’s Daily Online…
More financial support from the government will bolster the domestic aviation industry, which is facing strong competition from foreign players such as Boeing and Airbus, said Wu Guanghui, vice-president of the Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China Ltd (COMAC).
China is forecast to need about 4,000 planes in the next 20 years.
State fund for homegrown jumbo jet urged
Major domestic airlines such as Air China, China Eastern and China Southern, as well as Sichuan Airlines and Hainan Airlines, have expressed strong interest and support in buying his company’s jumbo jet, Wu said.
The letter “C” in the title of the country’s first homegrown jumbo jet is said to stand for “China” as well as “COMAC”, while the first “9″ implies “forever” in Chinese culture and the “19″ stands for the jet’s maximum 190 seats.
The single-aisle jetliner is designed for short- to medium-haul flights of up to 5,555 km.
The draft design of the country’s first independently developed jumbo jet will be completed by this year and be put into production by next year, Wu had said earlier.
The plane is slated to test fly in 2014 and be ready for deliveries after 2016. COMAC, which was founded in 2008 to take charge of the country’s jumbo jet project, expects to sell 2,000 C919 planes at home and abroad in the next two decades, Wu said.
State fund for homegrown jumbo jet urged
“But what could harm the sales of the domestically made planes is that very few aircraft-leasing companies buy domestic airplanes and rent them to airlines,” he said in an interview with China Daily.
“Leasing is the major way for airlines to expand the fleet … and the situation will especially hinder small airlines, which are short of funds, from buying the cheaper homemade jets.”
Wu suggested that the government establish a State fund of at least 30 billion yuan to help homegrown jet buyers with their financing. – read more at ChinaDaily.com…
A Boeing 787 Dreamliner flies over onlookers during its maiden test flight in Washington on Tuesday. (Agencies)
The three-hour maiden flight on Tuesday of the light and fuel-efficient airplane was cut short from the planned five because of bad weather.
Boeing said on Tuesday it hopes to deliver its first 787 – to Japan’s All Nippon Airways – during the fourth quarter next year.
Boeing China yesterday declined to say when it hopes to deliver aircraft ordered by Chinese customers. A source with China Southern, the largest domestic airline by fleet size, said it expects to receive 10 starting in 2011.
“We plan to use the 787 jet to gradually replace part of our Boeing 777 jets on international flights to Europe, America and Australia,” the source, who declined to be named, told China Daily.
State broadcaster CCTV said industry insiders believe the 787 will become one of the main models in China.
The aircraft, which has been described as “game-changing”, went no higher than 4,572 m, at a maximum speed of about 333 km per hour, during its test flight but it was hailed as “a milestone” for aviation.
The United States aerospace giant hopes the Dreamliner will revolutionize the airline industry worldwide.
The medium-sized, twin-aisle 787 is being marketed as the world’s first passenger airplane made largely from lightweight composite materials, such as carbon fiber. Other passenger jets are made mainly from aluminum and titanium.
Because it is so light, the plane will use 20 percent less fuel than comparable aircraft and produce fewer emissions, Boeing said.
David Wang, president of Boeing China, said the 787 is also “a milestone in Boeing’s partnership with China’s aviation industry” because three Chinese companies – from Chengdu, Harbin and Shenyang – are producing its rudder, wing-to-body fairing and vertical fin leading edge.
Among the three, Chengdu Aircraft Corp is Boeing’s sole supplier of the 787′s rudder.
“This signifies that China’s aviation industry is no longer a contract manufacturer, but has entered strategic cooperation (with Boeing) in the development of an advanced passenger jet,” Boeing China said in a news release. – read more at ChinaDaily.com…
Boeing 787 Dreamliner - A big future in Asia?
The Asia-Pacific region will lead the global aviation market with growing demand and become a new center of the world aviation market in the next two decades, said Kenneth G. Yata, Vice President of Business Development of Boeing (China) Co., Ltd. at an international forum on manufacturing industry management held Saturday in Tianjin, a north China port city.
As demand in Europe and the United States slows, the Asia-Pacific region will become the leading market for commercial airplanes due to increasing demand for tourism, passenger and freight transport, said Yata.
He said, passenger flow by air will increase by an average 6.5 percent annually in the region in the coming two decades, surpassing the North American and European markets. – read more at ChinaView.cn…
