Qatar Airways plans large Bombardier

Montreal Qatar Airways Ltd plans to place a large business-jet order with Bombardier Inc amid an expansion that may double the size of its charter fleet. Qatar Executive, the carrier's business-jet unit, already flies six Bombardier business jets, including three Challenger 605s. Qatar CEO Akbar Al Baker declined to specify the size of the planned order in a speech yesterday in Montreal. "We want to be a major executive-jet provider company," Al Baker told reporters afterwards. Qatar Executive doesn't compete in size, he said, and would be "satisfied with around ten to 15 aircraft in our fleet of the corporate-jet size". Qatar's order will be announced at the European Business Aviation Convention and Exhibition in May, Al Baker said. Business-jet sales increased 79 per cent last year at Bombardier, which is also developing the CSeries narrow-body jet to compete with the smallest commercial planes from Boeing and Airbus. Bombardier climbed 2.5 per cent to C$4.03 (Dh14.85) at the close of trading in Toronto on Thursday. The shares have changed little this year. Qatar Airways plans to acquire larger business aircraft "the size of the Airbus A320", too, Al Baker said. The carrier would be interested in Bombardier's Global 7000 and Global 8000 models, which have a list price of about $65 million (Dh238.8 million), he said. The Montreal-based manufacturer's CEO, Pierre Beaudoin, plans to start delivering the Global 7000 in 2016, with the Global 8000 entering service the following year. The commercial debut of the CSeries, which cost about $3.5 billion to develop, is planned for 2013. While Qatar Airways said last month it was shelving plans to buy the new narrow-body aircraft, the carrier remains "very interested" and will consider a purchase later, Al Baker said yesterday. The CEO said he planned to visit Bombardier facilities north of Montreal yesterday. The CSeries is well-suited for a niche market, said Al Baker, who described it as a "very fuel efficient and a very technologically advanced aircraft". Qatar was initially looking to place 20 to 30 firm orders for the CSeries, and take a similar number of options, Al Baker said. The carrier isn't in a position to order the aircraft today because it's busy integrating new models such as Boeing's 787 and Airbus' A350 into its fleet, he said. Qatar would probably fly the CSeries on regional flights of no more than two and a half hours from its Doha hub, Al Baker also said. "We feel that this aircraft is the optimum aircraft for that kind of range," he said.