Boeing vs Airbus Market Share

Today I had a quick conversation and a question was on the table: how long will take for a newcomer in the larger than 100 passenger airplane segment for being able to face both Airbus and Boeing?

787 problem, impact?

Yes, AOG (Aircraft on Ground) for the 787. The source of the problem: failures at their lithium-ion batteries. Is this a big issue? Well, for Boeing it is. Airlines and certification authorities are now transferring some pressure on Boeing...

What's about passengers?

A320 Sharklet delivered to Air Asia

Air Asia has become the very first operator of the new A320 equiped with Sharklet option. The delivery was performed last 21th at Toulouse. So, Airbus met their target in delivering before the end of the year the first Sharklet to the customers. So... updating the list...


Q4 2012 (Achieved):                 A320 Sharklet EIS
December 2012 June 2013:       CS100 first flight
H1 2013:                                    A350-900 first flight
end 2013 June 2014:                  CS100 EIS
H1 H2 2014:                              A350-900 EIS
2014:                                          C919 first flight
end 2014:                                   CS300 EIS
October 2015:                            A320NEO EIS
mid 2016:                                   A350-800 EIS
2016:                                          C919 first flight
2017:                                          A350-1000 EIS
2017:                                          B737 MAX EIS

EADS selected as disruptive company

MIT technology review has published their view of the companies implementing disruptive technologies. EADS is one of the selected companies for their investment in weight reduction by redesigning them taking the advantage of 3D printers.

How really Ryanair is making money?

Curiosity brought me to take a look to the P&L summary of Ryanair, Easyjet and Lufthansa. By a quick analysis we can see that there are 2 main revenues perceived by the three airlines, the called "scheduled revenues" and the "ancillary revenues". The first ones represent the traditional ticket selling revenues, and the others are baggages fees, marketing on web pages, sells on board... and other revenues not coming from tickets.

Message is clear, no airline is able to make profit without ancillary revenues (in Ryanair you will need to include financial losses to get losses) and they represent one of the main contribution to the revenues being an important percentage of total revenues, more precisely: Ryanair (2011) 18,7%, Easyjet (2009) 20,7% and Lufthansa (2011) 17,2%.

Bombardier's delay on CSeries

One month before the expected CS300 first flight, Bombardier has announced a delay of the first flight of CS100, the newcomer in the market at single aisle business setting only 2 years of difference compared to NEO. Seems that the problem is on supplier chain, an extended issue all along the industry as experienced (in a different subject) in B787.

Updating our calendar...

Q4 2012:                                    A320 Sharklet EIS
December 2012 June 2013:       CS100 first flight
H1 2013:                                    A350-900 first flight
end 2013 June 2014:                  CS100 EIS
H1 H2 2014:                              A350-900 EIS
2014:                                          C919 first flight
end 2014:                                   CS300 EIS
October 2015:                            A320NEO EIS
mid 2016:                                   A350-800 EIS
2016:                                          C919 first flight
2017:                                          A350-1000 EIS
2017:                                          B737 MAX EIS

100-149 passengers further look

Some further comments are appearing in the internet concerning this market segment and about newcomers on the ground. Turbulence in the next five years will appear, AirEnsight argues that an important number of old models being recently sold (reducing investment costs) joined with airplanes with better economics will create an interesting market movement in the coming years.

Just for adding new arguments on the discussion I tried to analyze in detail the data summarized by Leeham concerning the current demand and deliveries of each aircraft. The market is reacting similar to other segments, on which important demand is concentrated at peaks in specific years, with important cyclic behaviour (take into account 2001 and 2002 gaps in this analysis). Looks like the train is only passing by at those years, and you need to be at the station. The right move was done by Embraer capturing important demand during early 2000s, seems that Bombardier came unfourtunately late to the game. For understanding SSJ100 sales we need to consider the mayority of sales are Russian influenced contries, pick in sales early 2010s reflect this.