COMAC’s C919 Now Has Orders From All Of China’s Big 3 Airlines

Just three days after Air China announced its order for 100 C919 aircraft, on April 29th, China Southern Airlines issued a statement on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange announcing the signing of a contract with Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China (COMAC) for 100 C919 aircraft on the same day. The catalog price of the order amounts to US$9.9 billion.

This means that COMAC has secured orders for the C919 from all three Chinese central government-owned airlines. Apart from China Eastern Airlines, which signed a tentative order for 5 C919 aircraft as the launch customer in 2021, each of the three major airlines has placed a substantial order for 100 C919 aircraft.

The catalog price of $99 million per aircraft indicates that China Southern Airlines has ordered the basic version of the C919, consistent with the 100 aircraft ordered by China Eastern Airlines. Meanwhile, Air China’s order is for the extended-range version of the C919, which has a catalog price of $108 million per aircraft, approximately 9% more expensive than the basic version of the C919.

C919’s confirmed orders have surged in the last seven months

According to Simple Flying’s statistics, all confirmed orders for the C919 (orders with publicly announced delivery schedules) are from China’s three major airlines, totaling 305 aircraft, with 200 secured in the past week alone.

Additionally, on April 27th, 2023, ranked fourth in China’s fleet size, the restructured HNA Group signed a framework agreement with COMAC to purchase 100 aircraft, including 60 C919 aircraft and 40 ARJ21 aircraft. Among the 60 C919 aircraft, the plan involves 30 each for HNA Group’s subsidiaries, Suparna Airlines and Urumqi Air.

Photo: COMAC

Since signing the framework agreement a year ago, neither Hainan Airlines nor COMAC has publicly announced any further confirmed purchase agreement. However, it was just last week that Suparna Airlines suddenly announced,

“In the fourth quarter of 2024, Suparna Airlines will receive its first C919 aircraft, becoming the world’s first privately-owned airline to operate the C919. The plan is to introduce a total of 30 C919 aircraft by the end of 2027, gradually establishing a passenger transport operation model based solely on China-developed C919 aircraft.”

In addition, the 30 C919 aircraft for Urumqi Air, the 40 C919 high-altitude variant aircraft secured by Tibet Airlines at the Singapore Airshow in February this year, and the 5 C919 orders signed by the China-backed Brunei Gallop Air last September are all considered tentative orders.

On September 10th last year, at a forum in Shanghai, He Dongfeng, Chairman of COMAC, revealed that the number of C919 orders had reached 1,061. If only 5 of those 1,061 aircraft were confirmed orders at the time, then seven months later, there has been a breakthrough in terms of the number of C919 confirmed orders.

Do you consider the C919 project successful after each of the three major airlines placed orders for 100 aircraft? Please share your thoughts with Simple Flying.