How China Could Challenge the Boeing-Airbus Duopoly

[Nilgiri]

Are you saying Canadian government should have done more in Airbus acquisition of majority in C series?

Airbus has scored a lottery in buying C series, which put it in a excellent position in capturing lion share of the middle of the market, all thanks Boeing’s bullying.

China’s main program C919 starts from the class of the best selling airliners of all time-A320 and Boeing 737. While it is the most sensible entry point with classical, time testing congratulations, it is also the most competitive one. Hoping China can come up something to capture at least some of MOM segments before Airbus gets everything.

Yeah...well actually process before that ...it involved banks/investors/politicians etc etc (really at the time Airbus came sniffing around, it was already too late tbh and I and many could see the writing on the wall). It is really a long conversation, but it has left a bitter taste for many....because we have seen this happen all too often with Canada before....because everything is too integrated so we don't have the bulk to keep some crucial (long term) things independent as our own for greater good etc. But China has like 45 times more people...so you guys can just power through all that stuff as you need to....in fact big guys following later can learn from your experience (however it turns out) hopefully as well.

 

[GeraltofRivia]

Yeah...well actually process before that ...it involved banks/investors/politicians etc etc (really at the time Airbus came sniffing around, it was already too late tbh and I and many could see the writing on the wall). It is really a long conversation, but it has left a bitter taste for many....because we have seen this happen all too often with Canada before....because everything is too integrated so we don't have the bulk to keep some crucial (long term) things independent as our own for greater good etc. But China has like 45 times more people...so you guys can just power through all that stuff as you need to....in fact big guys following later can learn from your experience (however it turns out) hopefully as well.

Tbh I think the best play for bombardier is to form a partnership with COMAC to focus on Chinese market, as opposed to selling to Airbus, which basically means it gets absorbed into Airbus’s portfolio and end of bombardier’s venture into middle size market. Airbus has been interested in C series for years but it won’t be so lucky without Boeing. I know it is politically incorrect to fall towards China but it is sensible if one looks through the distorted lens and actually think about shareholder’s interest.

There has been some discussions between bombardier and Comac in 2017 and then the Boeing saga tool place all the sudden. Bombardier probably didn’t expect Boeing to go this far given C100 was not even in Boeing’s major segment. This gave Airbus to golden opportunity to seal the deal.

China is keen to diversify its plane supplier and the market is sufficiently large for bombardier, even with the incoming C919, which is still a few years away from being rolled out in mass. Also there is potential for other high growth market like India next door that will have huge demand for jets.

 

[nahtanbob]

China is not Russia, it's all about money and will, China just started fast development a decade ago, and a decade ago I still remember that people lamented that China could not even make a cellphone but now Chinese phones are dominating the world market, a decade ago China only knows bullet trains from Japan and now over 60% of the world highspeed railways are from China, that's how fast the country develops.

Do not tell me USSR did not have the money or the will

 

[LKJ86]

Do not tell me USSR did not have the money or the will

That is the reason why China chooses to follow the pattern of Boeing and Airbus to develop commercial airliners.

 

[Nilgiri]

Tbh I think the best play for bombardier is to form a partnership with COMAC to focus on Chinese market, as opposed to selling to Airbus, which basically means it gets absorbed into Airbus’s portfolio and end of bombardier’s venture into middle size market. Airbus has been interested in C series for years but it won’t be so lucky without Boeing. I know it is politically incorrect to fall towards China but it is sensible if one looks through the distorted lens and actually think about shareholder’s interest.

There has been some discussions between bombardier and Comac in 2017 and then the Boeing saga tool place all the sudden. Bombardier probably didn’t expect Boeing to go this far given C100 was not even in Boeing’s major segment. This gave Airbus to golden opportunity to seal the deal.

China is keen to diversify its plane supplier and the market is sufficiently large for bombardier, even with the incoming C919, which is still a few years away from being rolled out in mass. Also there is potential for other high growth market like India next door that will have huge demand for jets.

Problem is a lot of IPR (especially process related) is not owned by Bombardier itself (if you dig enough like I have done when I was exploring the inflexibility of certain things.... lot of it is based either in US or UK given how Bombardier even formed in the first place esp its ownership routes). So simply any major alliance with China (past say generic more vanilla stuff) in this regard is out of the question (its past my pay grade by far)....given what lot of these IPR owners also own elsewhere or are connected to financially/politically/militarily etc....no matter how much sense it may make more broadly in economic sense.

But yeah you sum it up with "politically incorrect".

But anyway there is good silver lining for China to do things the more arduous way on some things...if you own every brick....generally the edifice is resilient for crucial frontier parts of technology....otherwise its a matter of some scale of porosity ( rather than impervious so you can then adequately focus on how hard to start launching things long term with political buffer especially).

 

[Darwin]

Biggest problem is of airworthiness certification.
Suppose China tries to replace Western systems or engines with local ones, re-certification of the whole plane will be required from Western agencies.
Unlike other products,, a non certified plane won't even get overflying permission from unfriendly nations.
Wonder how the Soviets and Russians handled this? Probably refused landing and overflying for the Western planes till theirs got permissions.

Edit - out of a fleet of 250 planes in aeroflot, only 50 are Russian made. And all Russian planes need European certification to fly.

 

[Han Patriot]

True but since except the body everything else is sourced from western suppliers , this is a good attempt at assembly. The tap can be closed at any time like the chinese phone last year.
Wikipedia-
"Systems

the air conditioning made by Liebherr
The engine's nacelle, thrust reverser and exhaust system will be provided by Nexcelle, with such features as an advanced inlet configuration, the extensive use of composites and acoustic treatment and an electrically operated thrust reverser.[50]Michelin will supply Air X radial tyres.[51] Its integrated modular avionics architecture is based on Ethernet.[35] The landing gear is made in China by a joint venture of Germany's Liebherr and Avic’s Landing Gear Advanced Manufacturing Corp: Liebherr LAMC Aviation.[40]

While the airframe is entirely made by Chinese Avic, most systems are made by Western-Chinese joint-ventures: with UTAS for the electric power, fire protection and lighting; with Rockwell Collins for the cabin systems and avionics, with Thales for the IFE, with Honeywell for the flight controls, APU, wheels and brakes; with Moog for the high lift system; with Parker for the hydraulics, actuators and fuel systems, with Liebherr for the landing gear and air management; and the CFM engine and Nexcelle nacelle are entirely foreign.[52]

EnginesEdit

CFM International LEAP mockup
Both Pratt & Whitney and CFM International offered to provide the engines for the aircraft, the former offering the PW1000G and the latter the LEAP-1C;[53]the latter was ultimately selected"

Those suppliers can easily be replaced by 'Chinese' ones. It's just an attempt to lure them here to set up manufacturing and transfer technology. It's an old game my friend. Huawei can replace the components with domestically made ones, but it will take some time.