Indian carriers go shopping

Low-cost carrier Spicejet on Tuesday signed a $700-million deal for ten aircraft with Boeing, even as Jet Airways and state-owned Air-India and Indian Airlines placed orders worth $3 billion for aircraft engines.

General Electric said it had won an order worth more than $2.2 billion from Air-India for engines for the airline's new Boeing 777 and 787 fleets. The company said in a statement that Air-India had placed an order for the GE90-115B engine for eight 777-200LRs and 15 777-300ERs. In addition, the airline has ordered for the GEnx engine to power 27 787-8 aircraft.

Indian, as Indian Airlines is called now, signed a deal worth $500 million with CFM International to purchase engines for its newly acquired fleet of Airbus aircraft. The CFM56-5b engine will power Indian's new fleet of 43 Airbus A320 family of aircraft scheduled for delivery between late 2006 and 2010, according to a CFM release.

CFM is a 50:50 joint venture between French aeroengine major Snecma and US engine maker General Electric.

Last year, Indian had placed a $2.5-billion order with Airbus  for 43 planes. The airline recently took delivery of leased CFM56-5b-powered A319s, making it the first A319 operator in India.

Jet Airways has selected GE's CF6-80E1 engines to power its 10 Airbus A330-200 aircraft. The order is worth $300 million. The airline is scheduled to start receiving the new aircraft in 2007. Spicejet's deal was for 10 737 jets from US aircraft manufacturer Boeing, worth $700 million at Asian Aerospace, the world's third-largest airshow.

The deal includes an option to buy 10 more aircraft. The purchase is for five 737-800 and five 737-900 models. Deliveries will begin in October 2007 with the handing over of a 737-900. Shipments will continue until 2009.

"We are absolutely delighted to be placing a new order with Boeing and we think that this new order reflects the rapid growth in the Indian aviation market," said Ajay Singh, director of Spicejet.

Dinesh Keskar, Boeing's senior vice-president for sales, said he expected the orders to enable Spicejet to increase its market share.

Keskar said the 737-800 had 189 seats in an all-economy configuration, while the 737-900 had 215 seats.