• PAGE ONE
• INDEX
• HOME

Commercial launch of largest airliner A3XX -- Airbus hopeful of getting authorisation in 2 weeks

Ashwini Phadnis

TOULOUSE, June 20

THE European aircraft manufacturer, Airbus Industrie, hopes to have the authorisation from its supervisory board for the commercial launch of A3XX aircraft, the world's largest airliner, in the next two weeks.

``In the coming two weeks, we hope to get authorisation from our supervisory board to offer the A3XX to at least those carriers, who have already shown interest in this aircraft. This authorisation will help us put in place a permanent contract with the airline, including the specification of the aircraft, cost and even the delivery date,'' the aircraft manufacturer's Regional Manager Press Relations, Mr. David Velupillai, told a group of visiting Indian journalists.

Officials pointed out that when there is ``sufficient'' commitment of interest from international airlines, the manufacturers will go back to the supervisory board to seek permission for financial launch of the aircraft, which they hope to have in place by the end of the year.

Airbus is hopeful of having the full A3XX programme ``going ahead'' by the end of the current year and have the aircraft enter service in 2005. ``We hope to have the first of the several test flights with the A3XX aircraft in 2004 and for it to enter com mercial service in 2005,'' Mr. Velupillai said.

Though the aircraft manufacturer has already received ``commitments of interest'' for the A3XX aircraft from eight international carriers, they were willing to name only five -- Singapore Airlines, International Lease Finance Co-operation, Air France, Vi rgin Atlantic and Emirates.

Airbus officials said that they had ``expression of interest'' from various airlines for close to 40 A3XX aircraft already with SIA, Emirates and Air France reportedly showing ``expression of interest'' for around 10 aircraft each.

The aircraft is to have a catalogue price of around $230 millions, but Airbus officials said the exact price for each customer airline was likely to vary. Officials pointed out that it will cost Airbus Industrie around $10-12 billions to ``construct and build'' the A3XX family.

The passenger loads which the A3XX aircraft will have to carry to make the service a profitable one will vary, depending on the sector on which the aircraft is being operated. It had been calculated that even if only 400 seats of the 550 seats available on the aircraft were full, the sector would return profits for the operator, officials said. ``The thumb-rule calculation is that the airline should be able to break-even, if they fill 400 seats on the aircraft. Whatever additional seats they sell will g enerate sheer profit for the operator,'' Mr. Velupillai said.

The initial A3XX-100 will carry 555 passengers on routes of up to 14,200 km allowing non-stop flights on heavily travelled routes such as Sydney-Los Angeles, Singapore-London and Hong Kong-San Francisco. The A3XX would share cockpit commonality with the Airbus A-320 and Airbus A-330/340 families, while using the latest technology, thereby providing the operator saving in terms of training of crew and flexibility of operations, officials said.

Meanwhile, plans are also afoot to launch a cargo version of the aircraft, for which Airbus claimed some big names in the industry had already shown interest, including Atlas Cargo and Federal Express.