Translated material
Divide three trillion
Demand for aircraft will increase in a few years
A forecast for the development of the global aviation market for the next 20 years, compiled by experts from the American company Boeing, was presented yesterday at the Le Bourget 2009 international air show by the executive vice president of the aircraft manufacturing giant, head of Boeing's civil aircraft division, Scott Carson (pictured) . In his opinion, the commercial aviation market will grow steadily in the long term.Mr. Carson did not ignore the problems that are currently slowing down the forward progress of the air transport and aircraft manufacturing business: the global economic recession, political instability in many regions of the planet, fluctuations in fuel prices, and the swine flu epidemic. However, he believes that sooner or later the positive trends of the growing global market will prevail over these negative circumstances.
There are now 18,800 mainline aircraft in operation around the world, Boeing experts have calculated. By 2028, the global civil air fleet will increase to 35,600 units. That is, there will be 16,800 aircraft (58%) more. However, aircraft manufacturers can safely count on selling even more aircraft. The fact is that the 12,200 aircraft currently flying will by that time fail and require replacement. In total, according to Boeing's forecast, in the next 20 years the world's airlines will be forced to buy (and aircraft factories will be able to sell) 29 thousand aircraft worth a total of $3.2 trillion.
It will be interesting to see how this huge sales volume is distributed across aircraft classes. The lion's share (47%) will fall on long-haul aircraft of the class of Boeing-787 and Airbus-350 currently being designed. The Russian aviation industry cannot offer the buyer anything in this niche and does not plan any breakthroughs in the foreseeable future.
Airlines will pay almost the same amount of money (44%) for medium-range aircraft, such as the Boeing 737 and Airbus 320. Russia has here the Tu-204, which experts already recognize as obsolete, as well as the MS-21 project, which is at an early stage of implementation.
Another 7% of 3 trillion will go to high-capacity aircraft, that is, the Airbus-380. They don't do anything like this in Russia. To be fair, it should be noted that no one in the world, except Airbus, produces cars of this size. Boeing experts “allocated” only 2% of global costs for updating the air fleet in the next 20 years for regional aircraft. Russia is now proudly demonstrating its latest achievement in this category - the Sukhoi Superjet 100 (SSJ-100) - in Le Bourget. It is with this product that it intends to return to the international civil aviation market.
It cannot be said that the market for regional aircraft is free. On the contrary, despite its modest size compared to long-haul transport, it is here that the number of competing firms and projects is greater than in other “weight categories”. The Canadian company Bombardier and the Brazilian Embraer are considered world leaders, but, for example, aircraft manufacturers in China and Ukraine are making claims for a piece of this pie.
Bombardier distributed its forecast at the Le Bourget air show, also for 20 years, but only for regional aircraft. According to Bombardier calculations, sales of aircraft designed to carry from 20 to 149 passengers from 2009 to 2028 will amount to 12,400 aircraft with a total value of approximately $589 billion. Including 300 aircraft with a capacity of 20 to 59 people will be sold, 5,800 aircraft designed to transport from 60 to 99 passengers, and 6,300 aircraft with a size of 100-149 passengers.
The SSJ-100, which is designed in two versions, with 75 and 95 seats, will compete in the middle of the above groups. Speaking on the opening day of Le Bourget 2009, General Director of the Sukhoi Corporation Mikhail Pogosyan said about the SSJ-100 production plans: “We want to reach the production of 70 aircraft per year by 2012 and win 20% of the market in this class.” . Based on Bombardier's calculations, in the next 20 years, on average, 290 regional airliners with a capacity of 60-99 passengers will be purchased in the world per year. If Sukhoi wants to add 70 of its cars to this market annually, then it will have to take away from its competitors a market share of about 25%: a little more than Mr. Pogosyan said, but not much. Of course, conquering both 25% and 20% of the world market is a difficult task. Only time will tell how successfully the Sukhoi Corporation will cope with it.