Brazil's 3rd-biggest airline, Azul Linhas Aereas, unveiled plans to add 11 wide-body jets from Airbus to start service to the United States.
Azul said it would receive 6 Airbus A330-200s in early 2015, when the airline will begin flying overseas, and 5 Airbus A350-900 jets starting in early 2017.
Together the planes are worth close to $2 billion at list prices, executives said at a news conference near Azul's hub in Campinas, outside Sao Paulo. The airline has secured leasing deals from industry financier ILFC for 8 of the planes. It is still negotiating the lease or purchase of 3 A330s.
The expansion will transform Azul, which is controlled by JetBlue Airways founder David Neeleman, from a niche regional carrier into an international player directly challenging heavyweight Latam Airlines Group, which controls Brazil's No. 1 carrier, TAM Linhas Aereas (with an order of 27 A350-900).
The strategy contrasts with Brazil's No.2 airline Gol Linhas Aereas, which started domestic service with a uniform fleet of Boeing 737s and now flies those jets to the United States with a layover to refuel in the Dominican Republic.
The leasing arrangement does not directly generate a new sale for Airbus.
Azul also signed a $400 million service contract with Britain's Rolls-Royce, which makes the jet engines that power the Airbus aircraft.
Based on the article “Brazil's Azul adds Airbus jets to start U.S. flights” published in Reuters.
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The selection of the A350 was mostly on technical basis and is believed to be the right sized aircraft for Azul’s needs. Leasing was selected because of earlier delivery slots and more economic sense. All the aircraft are coming via ILFC. First markets to be served will be Florida and New York.
Airbus biggest mistake was to make the A380. The most popular Aircraft from Boeing was the 777,is was obvious that the way to go for Boeing,was a new improved 777-thus the 777x. Airbus should have made the A350 a replacement for the A320/30. Built their own 777x. Most of the A380 flights run at about 400 seats,same as the 777x. Which means the A380 is at a disadvantage with 4 engines. The 747 was on its way out because of its four engines as against the coming 2 engine wide body aircraft. So now,Airbus has a problem,its hidden because of the sales of the A320 neo but in essence the A380 is finished and the A350 is losing sales at both ends.
ReplyDeleteIt would be interesting to see if Neeleman would take back control of Jetblue and try to integrate both carriers.
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