DUBAI, 12 December 2003 — The world’s third largest air show wound up in Dubai yesterday with at least $7.5 billion worth of deals signed amid fierce competition between civil and military aviation leaders for a slice of the region’s fast growing market.
Qatar stole the show on the civilian side by firming up an order with Airbus Industrie worth about $3 billion for new aircraft and announcing it will soon tender construction contracts valued at about $2.5 billion for Doha’s new international airport.
“This is all part of the expansion plans of Qatar Airways and the government of Qatar is spending a lot of money on a new state-of-the-art airport to make Doha an international hub,” Akbar Al-Baker, president and chief executive of Qatar Airways, told AFP.
The aircraft deal confirms memorandums of understanding announced in Paris last June and includes two A380 superjumbos with options for two more as well as two A340-600s with options for a further eight.
The planes are scheduled to be delivered in phases between June 2006 and early 2009 in time for the launch of Qatar’s new 12-million passenger-capacity airport in 2008 that it sees as a rival hub to Dubai.
Not to be outdone, Dubai’s flagship airline Emirates announced on Monday a $3 billion firm order for 199 engines to power its fleet of 45 A380s from the US General Electric-Pratt and Whitney (GE-PW) Engine Alliance.
The airline will receive its first A380 in September 2006. Emirates also announced with GE Aircraft deals worth about $245 million for engine maintenance and the building of an advanced jet engine test facility in Dubai. The contracts are part of Dubai’s ambition to become the Gulf’s leading transport and tourism hub.
The airline has announced a $26 billion program to expand its fleet and Dubai airport has embarked on a $4 billion expansion project to handle annual traffic of about 30 million passengers by 2010 and more than 60 million by 2020.
The world’s two main civil aircraft manufacturers, Airbus and Boeing, were in agreement on the growth potential of the Middle East air travel market but differed over how to best meet the region’s needs.
US giant Boeing said it expects the market to grow by nine percent above the global average over the next 20 years but that its European rival Airbus is misreading the needs of the market by making a push for jumbo jets.
It argued that growing market demand for more direct and frequent flights so that passengers can avoid congested global hubs can be better met with Boeing’s new generation of faster and more efficient 300-seater type jets, such as the 7E7 Dreamliner and not by super seaters such as the European consortium’s A380.
But Airbus disagreed saying the question of whether there is a market for the 380s is “now moot” given that it has already 123 orders confirmed for the super jet which will be delivered to its first client in early 2006.
“At the end, the customer decides. It is impossible to say if the market will develop through fragmentation or hub-to-hub, it develops through both,” said Airbus President and CEO Noel Forgeard, who headed a 40-member delegation from the company to Dubai.
On the military side, a lot of talks paving the way for future business took place behind closed doors, especially by the US delegation which was headed by General Michael “Buzz” Moseley, vice chief of staff of the US Air Force.
