Airlines Deals

The sky’s the limit for India’s aviation industry as it blew up nearly one billion dollars in a single day at UK’s Farnborough International Airshow – that’s emerging India for you.

The Farnborough International Airshow, is the industry’s biggest event this year, and two Indian companies GoAir and Kingfisher made its presence felt.

Airbus announced that the Indian low cost airline GoAir was buying 10 of its A320 planes, worth 670 million dollars - and if this wasn’t enough, GoAir also has an option to buy 10 more planes.

The Vijay Mallya-run Kingfisher airlines has ordered 300 million dollars worth of Pratt & Whitney engines to power its fleet of Airbus A330 planes it too has an option for 10 more.

When one would expect the aviation sector to be rattled by stiff competition and airfare wars aggravated by the fallout of the Jet-Sahara deal and soaring fuel prices, deals like these are painting a different picture. In fact, analysts expect this sector to grow at a whopping 30% over the next couple of years.

How accurate that turns out to be, remains to be seen. For now, the industry is busy ‘ shopping.

New additions and changes

European planemaker Airbus got the Farnborough International airshow off to a flying start by making a major announcement about a mid-sized jet. The company’s new CEO Christian Streiff, revealed Airbus is now planning three models of the A350 plane rather than the previously announced 2 and that they would have a new, wider fuselage.

Streiff said the plane is expected to roll out in 2012 but that Airbus would try to bump that forward.

He also announced a full review of the supply chain for the firm’s A380 superjumbo. Delays caused by production problems recently hit the company’s share price and led to a management shakeup both at Airbus and its parent company EADS.

On Sunday, the company’s U.S. competitor Boeing revealed that some areas of the fast-selling 787 Dreamliner are behind schedule, but said that shouldn’t push back its scheduled delivery date for customers in 2008.

What is clear is that the world’s biggest air show has become the stage for the latest phase in a fierce battle for future business.

After 5 consecutive years of booking more orders than its trans-Atlantic competitor, Airbus trails Boeing for new orders in 2006 by a significant margin.

The company is hoping that its radical revamp of the A350 will help regain lost ground by giving the world’s airlines more of what they want.