Airbus sells 140 planes worth $23 billion to China in one of its major deal

Airbus has signed an agreement to sell 140 aircraft to China, it said on Wednesday, in a deal worth almost $23 billion at list prices.

The agreement, signed during a visit by Chinese President Xi Jinping to Germany, is for 100 A320 family aircraft and 40 A350 planes, Airbus said.

"It's one of the biggest deals that we've signed in a long time," Airbus Group Chief Executive Tom Enders told journalists after signing the deal in Berlin.

The planes will be purchased by state-owned China Aviation Supplies Holding Company, which will then allocate them to Chinese airlines.

The A320 planes will be a mixture of the older CEO and the new NEO version with revamped engines, while the majority of the A350 orders are for the -900 model. The deal is flexible pending negotiations with the airlines.

Enders said he expected up to 50 per cent of the A320 family planes would come from the Airbus final assembly line in China.

Enders was making his first public appearance since Airbus rolled out a new structure, completing a recent merger between its parent company and its dominant planemaking arm, changes which included a shift in the reporting line for its commercial sales team to Enders.

Enders said the shift in reporting lines for the sales team reflected the fact that commercial aircraft head Fabrice Bregier had been given more tasks in his new role as group-wide chief operating officer.

With orders slowing and the focus shifting to the backlog, Enders said the shake-up allows Bregier to concentrate on deliveries.

"This is merely a burden sharing mechanism because the focus should be on execution and this is what it's all about," Enders said.\
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Singapore Airlines launches A350 from Mumbai

The Singapore Airlines group, which operates 175 weekly flights out of India, including 17 from the city, is replacing its ageing Boeing 777 fleet with the modern A350s in the Mumbai-Singapore sector from Saturday.

The airline group, which way back in 1992 had tried to enter the country with the Tatas and has since then tied up with same group and operates Vistara, refused to speculate on whether it is interested in the national carrier Air India, which has been put on block for privatisation.

"As a policy we don't respond to market speculation," was all Singapore Airlines India general manager David Lim would say when sought his views on the government's move to disinvest the debt-ridden airline and whether his group will be interested in the same.

The aviation policy allows 49 per cent ownership by foreign carriers in domestic airlines. The details of the Air India divestment is not clear.

He also announced discount fares as part of Singapore Airlines' 70th anniversary, starting from Rs 22,070, to the city-state in the new aircraft beginning tomorrow.

Singapore Airlines, on its own, operates over 55 flights a week from India, while the group, that comprises Silk Air, Scoot and Tiger Air, operates the rest connecting 15 cities in the country.

The new 253-seater wide-body plane, which is the youngest aircraft in the industry now, will have 42 business class seats, 24 premium economy and 187 economy seats, while the 777 was carrying 263 passengers.
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