A failure to obtain scope clause relief by US regional carriers could have the unintended effect of boosting sales prospects for the CRJ900 regional jet, predicts Bombardier vice-president of commercial operations Ross Mitchell.
In the latest round of contract negotiations with pilot unions, US airlines passed on increase seat and weight limits for regional jet fleets now capped at 76 seats and 39t (86,000lb) maximum take-off weight.
But the issue is set to return to the bargaining table when the next round of contracts are negotiated at the end of the decade, when the Mitsubishi Regional Jet and Embraer E175-E2 are scheduled to be available for operational service.
Speaking at the ISTAT Americas conference on 1 March, Mitchell didn't identify the MRJ and the E175-E2 by name but made the point that developing a new aircraft that exceeds the scope clause limit could be a risky bet.
"That's a scary place to be because you don't have control over it. It's uncertain where it goes. It's not that even your customers don't control it. It's your customers' pilots unions that control it," Mitchell says.
Unlike the E175-E2 and MRJ, the CRJ900 weighs 3t lighter than the maximum limit under existing scope clauses.
The aircraft is also configured with 76 seats in the US market, but that is an artificial limit on the layout, he says. If scope clauses add four to five seats to the limit, Bombardier could offer a configuration with up 81 seats by tightening seat pitch, he says.
Bombardier's competitors are also aware of the risk of scope-clause changes in the US market. The 85-seat-class E175-E2 is the third and final member of the EJet-E2 family, and is not scheduled to appear in service until 2020. If scope-clause relief is not obtained by then, Embraer has said it could still offer the original version of the E175 for US market, rather than deploy the stretched, re-engined and re-winged version of the aircraft.
But Bombardier also has a plan in case scope-clause limits are raised to allow the E175-E2 and the MRJ to compete for orders in the US regional market.
"All of a sudden the CRJ1000 comes into the equation," Mitchell says. "If you get a few extra seats it becomes a relevant player in the North American market. It certainly has operating costs that are well below the competition."
Source: Cirium Dashboard
