Renton, Washington: A huge backlog of orders at Boeing and Airbus may deter customers from placing new aircraft orders, the head of Boeing Commercial Airplanes has said ahead of the Dubai Airshow this November.
“When you start selling out and you’re selling so far out, sometimes there will be a little bit of a hesitation in the market place to buy too far out,” Ray Conner, Vice-Chairman of The Boeing Company and President and Chief Executive Officer of Boeing Commercial Airplanes, told reporters on a visit to the manufacturer’s offices in Renton, Washington on Tuesday.
Boeing’s backlog of aircraft orders is 5,700 while Airbus’ is 6,300.
“That’s a huge backlog,” Conner said.
The Middle East market includes some of Boeing’s and Airbus’ largest customers who have ordered hundreds of aircraft worth billions of dollars in recent years to keep up with their rapid expansion plans.
But the record Dubai Airshow 2013 orders, including the 259 orders and commitments for Boeing’s underdevelopment 777X, are unlikely to be repeated this year, Boeing says.
“Dubai has been the recent centrepiece for commitments from airlines for large orders [but] the record that was set in 2013 for orders will stand in 2015 for Boeing,” Marty Bentrott, vice president — sales, Middle East, Russia & Central Asia at Boeing, told reporters.
Boeing will head to the Middle East in November for the Dubai Airshow in what will be the only second major air show — after the Paris Air Show in July 2015 — since oil prices collapsed. The Farnborough Air show was held in July 2014 just as oil prices began to fall but before they had collapsed.
Despite the drop in oil prices, a major revenue source for the region, and a jittery regional economy, so far no airline has changed its delivery schedule with deferments and cancellations at “historic lows,” Conner said.
“We certainly haven’t seen deferments in the near term deliveries,” he said.
Boeing is hopeful of signing up Emirates, the region’s largest airline, to order its 787 Dreamliners at the Dubai Airshow. Emirates is reportedly interested in as many as 70 of the 787-9 and 787-10 variants that would replace a cancelled Airbus A350 order of the same number.
Boeing says it has eased Emirates’ concerns over the performance of the engine in hot weather.
“We’ve given them pretty good assurances that the existing engines will provide the capability they need in terms of payload out of Dubai,” he said.
Emirates has raised concerns that the engines would need to be pushed harder when operated in higher temperatures such as the Middle East summer where temperatures can soar above 50 degrees Celsius. Bentrott, however, said that was no longer a concern.
Both Etihad Airways and Qatar Airways operate the 787 Dreamliners.
Boeing is also “pretty close to having final configuration on Emirates’ new look interior,” Bentrott said.
The new interiors will be incorporated onto Emirates 777-300s that are going to be delivered over the next three years, he said. A similar concept would feature on 150 777X [aircraft], a revamped model of the jet, Bentrott said.
The new interior will feature across all three cabins but Bentrott declined to provide further details.
Emirates is developing a new premium cabin product for its first class that will be rolled out on its 777s and Airbus A380s.
