Boeing\u2019s safety troubles and the Airbus scramble to ramp up production should have left a gap for smaller rivals to challenge their dominatiion of the commercial airliner market.
\nYet the American and European giants face little near term threat to their lock on the medium and long-range aircraft markets, industry experts say, as the barriers to entry are too high for China\u2019s COMAC or Brazil\u2019s Embraer.
\nCOMAC did not bother to bring its new C919, its first entry into the key single-aisle medium-range aircraft segment, to this week\u2019s Farnborough airshow, Europe\u2019s top aviation industry gathering.
\nAirbus and Boeing meanwhile added more than 260 planes to their massive order books of nearly 15,000 aircraft.
\nThis despite the fact that an airline that orders a medium-range Airbus A320 or Boeing 737 MAX today will likely have to wait until the end of the decade to receive the plane. Both companies face supply chain and other problems that have hampered efforts to step up production.
\nIn the coming two decades airlines are estimated to need 42,000 new aircraft to rejuvenate their fleets with models that guzzle less fuel and emit less CO2, as well as to meet an expected doubling of global air traffic.
\n\u201cA significant narrow-bodies deficit remains through 2028 for the A320 family and longer for the 737 MAX,\u201d said Richard Evans, an analyst at aviation sector data firm
\nCirium.
\nNarrow-body or single-aisle aircraft are the workhorses of the commercial aviation industry, each carrying between 175 and 250 passengers on medium-range flights.
\nDespite the opening in the most popular commercial aircraft segment, it will not be easy for COMAC or Embraer to profit from the opportunity.
\nCOMAC\u2019s C919 has begun commercial flights in China. A state-owned firm, COMAC has nearly 1,200 orders for the jet, almost exclusively from Chinese airlines.
\nBeijing wanted the plane to reduce China\u2019s reliance on foreign technology and to gain a foothold in the global aircraft market. However, the plane has to date only been certified for use in China and production remains low-scale.
\nWithout certification from the Federal Aviatioin Authority in the United States and the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) the two major markets remain closed to the C919.
\n\u201cChinese airlines are the target market for the C919,\u201d said Pascal Fabre, an aerospace industry expert at AlixPartners consultancy.
\nHe said there are too many barriers, including political, for major Western airlines to add it to their fleet.
\nCOMAC sent a C919 to the Singapore airshow in February. The firm\u2019s small stand at Farnborough featured only small models of the jet.
\nAirbus and Boeing still expect COMAC to become a rival.
\n\u201cWe do take COMAC as a serious competitor,\u201d said Christian Scherer, who heads Airbus\u2019s commercial aircraft division.
\nBut not immediately, as they believe the C919 does not offer airlines anything new compared with Airbus and Boeing aircraft.
\n\u201cThere is no differentiation, there\u2019s no new value being brought to the market, which tells you that COMAC is really still trying to accede to a market that remains largely influenced by Airbus and Boeing,\u201d he added.
\nThe development of the technologies for the next generation of aircraft, which Airbus and Boeing have a lead on, are \u201cbig barriers to entry\u201d, said Scherer.
\nBrazil\u2019s Embraer is already an established player in the market for smaller, regional aircraft.
\nFor Fabre at AlixPartners, Embraer has the technical know-how to develop a medium-range plane that could compete with Airbus and Boeing.
\nThe problem is money. \u2013 Qatar Tribune<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Boeing\u2019s safety troubles and the Airbus scramble to ramp up production should have left a gap for smaller rivals to challenge their dominatiion of the commercial airliner market. Yet the American and European giants face little near term threat to their lock on the medium and long-range aircraft markets, industry experts say, as the barriers …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15905,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpscppro_dont_share_socialmedia":null,"_wpscppro_custom_social_share_image":0,"_facebook_share_type":"default","_twitter_share_type":"default","_linkedin_share_type":"default","_pinterest_share_type":"default","_linkedin_share_type_page":"","_instagram_share_type":"default","_medium_share_type":"","_threads_share_type":"","_google_business_share_type":"","_selected_social_profile":null,"_wpsp_enable_custom_social_template":false,"_wpsp_social_scheduling":{"enabled":false,"datetime":null,"platforms":[],"status":"template_only","dateOption":"today","timeOption":"now","customDays":"","customHours":"","customDate":"","customTime":"","schedulingType":"absolute"},"_wpsp_active_default_template":true},"categories":[98,102],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15904","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-companies","category-featured-en"],"yoast_head":"\n