Dubai Aerospace places order for A320 engines

Dubai: Dubai Aerospace Enterprise (DAE) has selected CFM56-5B engines to power 20 new Airbus A320 family aircraft.

"The engine order is valued at approximately $270 million (Dh990.9 million) at list price and DAE is scheduled to begin taking delivery in early 2011. These 20 aircraft are part of a 70-aircraft order the leasing company announced in July 2008," the company said in a statement.

George Mushahwar, DAE Group Acting Chief Executive said: "DAE aims to deliver superior service and quality to its customers and achieve its business objectives by working with the leading manufacturers in the sector. With this order, we continue our commitment to excellence in technology, quality and lifecycle costs across our fleet."

"We are excited to build on our previous order of 70 CFM56-7B powered B737NG aircraft, as we continue to achieve our vision of actively growing our world wide leasing business," said Bob Genise, Chief Executive Officer of DAE.

Reliability

"We are delighted to be able to offer the unrivalled CFM56-5B for DAE's A320 fleet," said David Joyce, President and CEO of CFM, parent company GE Aviation. "We are confident that the reliability and lower overall cost of ownership of our engine will prove to be a significant asset to DAE's customers."

All of DAE's CFM56-5B engines are of the Tech Insertion configuration. This configuration was introduced in September 2007 and, to date, the fleet of over 800 engines in service worldwide has logged nearly 2 million flight hours and more than 1 million flight cycles without a single engine-related event.

Over the engine's life cycle, Tech Insertion will also provide operators with longer time on wing and will lower maintenance costs between five and 12 percent, depending on the thrust rating. These benefits are achieved through improvements to the high-pressure compressor and the high- and low-pressure turbines.

CFM56-5B engines are a product of CFM International, a 50/50 joint company between Snecma (SAFRAN Group) and General Electric Company.