“I am pleased and honored to announce that IndiGo has entered into a contract with Airbus for the purchase of 500 A320 Family aircraft,” said Pieter Elbers, Chief Executive Officer of IndiGo, the young low-cost airline based in New Delhi, which currently holds 55% of its domestic market. The order concluded with Airbus on Monday, June 19, is the largest in civil aviation by volume, with a total of 500 single-aisle aircraft.
“No one has ever made an order of this size, and it is a testament to the potential of Indian aviation,” added the defector from the Dutch company KLM, on the dais of a crowded press room in the chalet. Airbus on the first day of the Paris Air Show.
The numbers are enough to make you dizzy. Because if the European aircraft manufacturer has not updated its catalog prices since 2018 and if Guillaume Faury, its executive president, has refused to communicate the amount of the contract, the transaction could reach the trifle of 55 billion dollars, according to the last known price. .
“Today, IndiGo operates approximately 300 devices, with another 480 expected to be delivered by the end of the decade,” the CEO said in a voice clouded with emotion.
India is the third largest air transport market in the world. According to Airbus forecasts, its air traffic should experience an average annual growth of 6.6% over the next two decades, a rate almost twice as high as the world average. In its updated forecasts last week, the aircraft manufacturer estimated that between 2023 and 2042, Indian domestic traffic should increase fivefold.
“With India’s economy waking up, we have a tremendous opportunity to bring air travel within reach of as many Indian customers as possible,” said Pieter Elbers, whose company now operates 1,800 flights a day. day, 16 years after its foundation. “We expect to welcome some 100 million customers on our planes this year,” he added. This is about as much as the Air France-KLM group in 2019, before the health crisis.
Another Indian company, Air India, was behind the previous largest order of civilian aircraft in history, 470 units last February, but broken down between 250 from Airbus and 220 from its American competitor Boeing. It included both single-aisle and jumbo jets, at higher prices.
Guillaume Faury, also moved, hailed an “incredible agreement between two parties” and expressed his “respect”, his “gratitude” for the relationship between IndiGo and his company.
The A320neo range is Airbus’ bestseller, but the aircraft manufacturer is struggling to increase its production rate since the shock of the health crisis. In 2022, a year still marked by supply difficulties, only 43 single-aisle aircraft per month left its European, American and Chinese factories, but Airbus is aiming for a rate of 75 by 2026.
Pieter Elbers and Airbus Chief Commercial Officer Christian Scherer agreed on the Indian aviation market on Monday: “This is just the beginning. »