Bombardier deal in China start of a partnership: analyst

Airplane makers to work on joint projects

Bombardier Inc. said it would take a year; it took 363 days.

The company Wednesday narrowed the areas of commonality it was pursuing with China’s Commercial Aircraft Corp. (COMAC) to four, nearly a year after announcing on March 24 last year a broad exploratory framework agreement of cooperation between its Cseries and COMAC’S C919, both airliners in development.

The most concrete project is for a cockpit that will feature many common avionics systems for both planes. The other definitive deals are to develop electrical systems jointly, develop aluminum-lithium standards and specifications, and complementary customer services, technical publications and co-location of teams. Bombardier expects to complete all four within 12 months.

The general agreement would yield specific subagreements within a year, Bombardier Aerospace vice- president for international affairs Benjamin Boehm told The Gazette last March.

Bombardier president Pierre Beaudoin said in Beijing Wednesday that the four initiatives “will build on the complementary nature of our respective products and expertise while helping to maximize both parties’ cost savings and market shares.”

The deal helps Bombardier solidify its aerospace manufacturing footprint in China, which Beijing expects for the aircraft-maker to sell its planes there. Asia, and China in particular, is in the process of taking over from North America and Europe as the world’s largest aircraft mar- ket.

Addison Schonland of industry newsletter Airinsight said the deal means Bombardier/comac partnership “strategy is less opaque – there is the beginning of a family approach.”

The Cseries is between 100 and 149 seats while the C919 begins at 150 passengers.

That family could present a formidable rival to the current duopoly in the 100- to 200-seat market, Airbus SAS and Boeing Co., Schonland said.

“Airlines now appear to have a new choice of aircraft.”

In Cseries sales campaigns, which have lagged in China, Bombardier can now “point to a larger model that many have been asking about,” he noted.

“(Bombardier) has always said it does not want to enter the 150-plus-seat market. Simultaneously, COMAC gets a partner that can move its program ahead – something it needs as it has to work through the (delayed) ARJ (regional-jet) program which is holding back the C919. It also is able to benefit from having smaller models of a family to tie into.”

But he also noted that serious obstacles remain to offering true airplane commonality to airlines.

The Cseries will be powered by Pratt & Whitney’s geared turbofan engine, while the C919 will feature

CFM’S LEAP-X. “Obviously, lots of details have to emerge,” Schonland said. “But a deal that seems to tie the Cseries and C919 together, however tenuously, is potentially quite disruptive.” Engine maintenance is a major issue over the life of an aircraft; the fewer model variety, the less expensive to repair and maintain.

The larger framework agreement also opens the door for Bombardier and COMAC to develop future airplanes jointly.