With a new joint venture between Airbus and Bombardier now in place for the CSeries, several factors have significantly changed the market dynamics for the aircraft. As a result, we have modified our previous forecast of the potential market for the CSeries.
Our last forecast for this market was published in June 2016 as the CSeries entered service with Swiss. At that time, we projected a market for 5,636 aircraft over the next 20 years and that Bombardier would capture between 1,900 and 2,400 sales.
Several new factors increase the likelihood of increased CSeries sales, including:
• The “endorsement” of the CSeries by Airbus as an effective and sound aircraft
• Integration of support into the Airbus support and training network
• Integration of the supply chain to capture scale economies and reduce costs
• Additional marketing support and existing Airbus relationships with major customers around the world
• Confidence by airlines and the financial community that the promise of the CSeries can now move forward without concerns about Bombardier’s fiscal stability
• The establishment of a second production line in Mobile, Alabama eliminates the proposed tariffs on the aircraft and re-opens the US market, including the major order from Delta.
These factors combine with the excellent entry into service experience and the performance of the CSeries aircraft that exceeded airline expectations on day one. There is no question that the CSeries is an excellent aircraft that is state of the art, but was held back by concerns over Bombardier’s long-term fiscal stability. Those issues are now moot.
Forecast Highlights
Our outlook for the 100-149 seat market as a whole remains a bit lower than Bombardier’s forecast, as we project 5,000 to 5,500 aircraft in this sector over the next 20 years. However, with the partnership with Airbus, we anticipate the CSeries market share will increase from around 40% of this market to 55-60% of this market, as the aircraft is simply better than any competing model, and now has the corporate strength behind it to ensure its success. This should result in sales of between 2,750 and 3,360 aircraft, a substantial increase over our prior forecast, with our new expected forecast midpoint of 3,010 aircraft.
Our full forecast report on the potential market for the CSeries will be available early next week.
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