Qatar Airways Agrees to Order 80 Airbus A350XWBs

Qatar Airways has agreed to buy 80 Airbus A350XWB aircraft.

The order will make the airline the largest customer for the A350XWB to date and the first one in the Middle East region.

Qatar Airways' chief executive offficer Akbar Al-Baker and Airbus President and CEO Louis Gallois signed a memorandum of agreement at the Elysee Palace in Paris for the acquisition of the all-new aircraft.

The two executives signed the agreement in the presence of His Highness Sheikh Hamad Bin Khalifa Al-Thani, Emir of the State of Qatar, and Nicolas Sarkozy, President of the French Republic.

The agreement supersedes an earlier one that Qatar Airways signed in 2005 for 60 of the original A350 aircraft.

After several Airbus customers--led by Steven Udvar-Hazy, CEO of the big aircraft leasing company International Lease Finance Corporation--complained publicly that the original A350 design was not technologically advanced enough to be competitive with the Boeing 787, Airbus abandoned that design. The company replaced it with the wider-fueslage A350XWB design that makes greater use of composite and advanced materials.

Qatar Airways' 80 A350XWBs will include 20 A350-800s, 40 A350-900s and 20 of the largest in the family, the A350-1000. Deliveries will begin in 2013. Qatar Airways will use its A350XWBs to complement its A330s and A340s on regional and long haul routes.

"The A350XWB will equip Qatar Airways with the very latest generation and most modern fleet," said Qatar Airways Chief Executive Officer Akbar Al-Baker. "In addition to unbeatable operating economics, the A350XWB shares the same cockpit commonality with other Airbus aircraft, especially the A380, so introducing the modernised fleet will be a simple and cost-efficient step."

The A350 XWB is Airbus' newest aircraft and the manufacturer claims that when it enters service it will be the world's most technologically advanced airliner. Airbus plans to design the aircraft to increase productivity for airlines and to offer best-of-class levels of passenger comfort, while reducing operating costs.

The manufacturer also expects the A350XWB to be one of the most fuel-efficient aircraft ever.

"This is an outstanding endorsement of our newest product by a leading world carrier," said Gallois of Qatar Airways' A350XWB order. "Qatar Airways has been a long standing Airbus customer with orders straddling all our aircraft families, including the A380."

In March, Finnair became the first customer to convert its commitment for the original A350 to an order for the A350XWB, ordering 11 examples of the new design to replace a previous order for nine of the superseded aircraft.

Before the Finnair and Qatar Airways A350XWB orders, Airbus said it had secured firm orders for 100 and commitments for another 82 of the originally proposed A350 design, from a total of 14 customers.

Should all these customers decide to transfer their original commitments over to the A350XWB, Airbus would have commitments for a total of 204 of the type.

As the situation stands, Airbus now holds firm orders for 91 A350XWBs, though Russian airline Aeroflot has said publicly it will order 22 A350XWBs, a commitment Airbus has not yet included in its A350 order totals.

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