Q Do you foresee the recent change of government in Britain, from Conservative to Labour, affecting the way you do business?
A In the short-term, no. In the long-term, some of the statements the new government have made are quite encouraging, in particular the emphasis they wish to place on value-creating businesses and recognition of a greater partnership between government and industry.
The other thing we've been encouraged by is they have clearly stated the process of the ongoing defence review is to re-confirm that our armed forces have the right equipment at the right time, and they are supporting Eurofighter in particular.
Q What are your feelings on the continued drift of the Eurofighter programme?
A One has to be fairly sanguine about these things. The course of a four-nation collaboration in Europe is always bound to be pretty rocky, as you need four sets of systems pulling together throughout the programme, and there always seems to be one or more of the parties coming up to, or out of, an election, so getting the budgetary releases is problematic.
The programme is an important one for us, and the sooner we can get the release to continue and make the production investment decisions, the better.
Q How would you view any further delays?
A That would certainly be regrettable, but not catastro-phic.
Q On the civil side, how do you see the search for an aircraft larger than the Boeing 747 progressing?
A Boeing currently has the aircraft of choice, so the question it has to answer is what improvements will generate an adequate return for its investors in terms of numbers of new aircraft. At Farnborough last year, it appeared the best compromise was quite a major derivative which would require quite significant change and large, non-recurring investment.
The market for such aircraft is limited to a small number of fairly major carriers and some of them were saying that the 747-500/600 was, in effect, too much aircraft for them.
Airbus can see a considerable upside on the A3XX; it's not cannibalistic for them, it's a whole new market. We're continuing in dialogue with Airbus and we are talking with prospective customers about how, where and when.
Q Would it be fair to say you have not had the best first half of a year, given your problems with the Trent 700?
A The Trent 700 incidents, which led to several inflight shutdowns on A330s following bearing failures traced to insufficient lubrication of a bearing in the Hispano Suiza-manufactured step-aside gearbox, validated two points.
The whole concept of ETOPS (extended-range twin-engine operations), and the reasoning behind it, was fully validated and at no time was the safety of the flight in any way impaired. Hispano Suiza and ourselves came up with a very rapid identification of the problem and how it could be rectified.
I think we have demonstrated to our customers that we are very alive to their problems and have a very rapid response to any difficulties that might arise.
Q What progress have you made with the RB211-524HT 'hybrid' programme, following your Memorandum of Under-standing with Boeing?
A The outstanding issue is actually flying the engine on a Boeing aircraft. We are very close to finalising that arrangement with a number of airlines.
Q What are the key messages you are pushing at Paris?
A The fact we now share the commercial market more or less evenly between Rolls-Royce, Pratt & Whitney and General Electric.
We are confidently looking forward to growing our market share to the point where the split between the three main engine manufacturers is one-third each.
Source: Flight Daily News
