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Air India is ordering 40 A350s and 210 aircraft from the A320neo family from
Airbus, parent company chairman N Chandrasekaran revealed on Tuesday at an
online press conference with Indian Prime Minister Modi and French President
Macron. He thus confirms the rumors of recent weeks about a large Airbus order.
 
Chandrasekaran added that it is a letter of intent and that the details still
need to be worked out. Air India already operates 27 A320neos and announced in
September that it would lease another 21 A320neos and four A321neos. There
will now be 140 A320neos and 70 A321neos, which will be equipped with CFM
LEAP-1A engines. The airline also flies with 23 older A320/A321s, but they
will almost certainly be phased out.
 
Air India becomes the first customer in India for the A350. It has ordered 34
A350-1000s and 6 A350-900s. According to engine manufacturer Rolls-Royce, Air
India has an option for a further 20 engines for 10 A350-1000s. It is
Rolls-Royce's largest order for the Trent XWB and the first in India. Airbus
has lobbied hard in recent months to sell the aircraft in the country.
 
Air India has been pursuing ambitious expansion plans since having been taken
over the Tata Group. The airline wants to gain market share in the
fast-growing Indian aviation market, where more than a billion people will fly
much more often due to rising prosperity in the coming years. Price fighter
IndiGo is now the number 1 in the Indian market.
 
In total, approximately 500 new aircraft will be added to the fleet, making
Air India one of the world's largest airlines.
 
After Air India announced a mega order with Airbus for 250 aircraft earlier in
the day, the order with Boeing now follows. The Indian airline is ordering 190
Boeing 737 MAXs, twenty 787-9s and ten 777-9s. The MAX is in versions -8 and
-10.
 
Air India has also taken out options on a further fifty 737 MAXs and twenty
787s, so that the total order can easily be increased from 220 to a maximum of
290 aircraft at a later date.
 
The deal with Boeing has a list price of $34 billion, according to Air India,
but since hefty discounts on new aircraft are common, especially for large
numbers, the actual price is likely to be around half that amount.
 
Air India has ordered a total of 470 aircraft today, that is about half the
size of United Airlines which is the largest airline company in the world. The
new aircraft should help Air India to gain market share in the fast-growing
Indian aviation market, where rising prosperity means that the population is
increasingly flying. Incidentally, these are still formal Letters of Intent,
which have to be confirmed later.
 
Since Air India is no longer a state-owned company, but has been taken over by
the Tata Group, the company has been working on ambitious expansion plans.
 
Competitor IndiGo, the current number 1 in the Indian aviation market, also
has about 500 aircraft on order. These are almost all aircraft from the Airbus
A320neo family. A big difference with this low-cost carrier is that Air India
also focuses on long-haul flights with its expansion. Hence the orders for a
total of 70 widebody's today.
 
An overview of the aircraft ordered:
190 Boeing 737 MAXs (exact subdivision per variant still unknown)
140 Airbus A320neos
70 Airbus A321neos
34 Airbus A350-1000s
20 Boeing 787-9s
10 Boeing 777-9s
6 Airbus A350-900s

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