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Airbus showcases A350 in China
June 24th 2016
Airbus will hold an A350 demonstration tour in China from June 25 to July 1, with scheduled stops in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Haikou and Chengdu. Read More »
The Toulouse-headquartered manufacturer foresees strong sales for its latest long-haul airliner on the Mainland. Only Air China and China Eastern Airlines have placed orders for ten and 20 -900 variants, respectively. Airbus has 800 A350 firm orders from 42 customers worldwide, with approximately 35% of the planes to be delivered to Asia-Pacific carriers.
Tianjin Airlines president, Liu Lu, last week told local media the A330, the A320, and the A350 will form the core of the carrier’s fleet. Neither Tianjin nor its parent, Hainan Airlines, has ordered the A350.
Having said that, Azul Brazilian Airlines president, Antonoaldo Neves, told Bloomberg the HNA Group, Hainan’s parent, would take two 2018 A350-900 delivery slots originally destined for Azul and leased from AerCap. Whether HNA will allocate them to Hong Kong Airlines, which already has 15 -900s on order, or place them with other carriers in the group remains to be seen.
In Hong Kong, Cathay Pacific Airways is talking to Airbus and Rolls-Royce about a stretched A350 variant (dubbed -2000, or -8000) that would allow the airline to fly to destinations such as Mexico City and Miami nonstop from its home base, according to Cathay chief executive, Ivan Chu. On May 30, Cathay took delivery of its first A350-900. The carrier has 22 A350-900s and 26 -1000s on order. Chu said the carrier will operate the -1000 to the U.S. east and west coasts from 2018.
Airbus says the Mainland aviation industry has made important contributions to the development and making of the “x-tra wide-body” twinjet. Airbus (Beijing) Engineering Centre and its local partner, Aviation Industry Corporation of China (AVIC), participated in the programme’s development, involving specific design work for the airframe, with some 5% of the airframe manufactured in China.
