BOMBARDIER REGIONAL Aircraft division has been given approval to offer to airlines the CRJ-X 70-seat stretched Canadair Regional Jet. The company had hoped to launch the aircraft at the Farnborough air show, but did not receive Bombardier board approval in time.
The Canadian manufacturer now hopes to launch the CRJ-X by the end of the year.
Pre-launch studies of the stretched Regional Jet were completed earlier this year, and Bombardier Regional Aircraft has been participating in detailed discussions with potential customers since then. Approval to offer means that the company can now provide price, performance and delivery guarantees.
Speaking at the 26 August roll-out of Bombardier's Global Express long-range business jet, chairman Laurent Beaudoin confirmed that the CRJ-X could be launched by the end of 1996.
He says that company resources and negotiations with risk-sharing partners are pacing the programme. Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI), already producing the Global Express wing and centre fuselage and designing the fuselage and empennage of the Bombardier de Havilland Dash 8-400, is expected to take a stake in the CRJ-X.
Beaudoin confirms that discussions are under way with MHI on other joint projects, including a possible100-seat regional jet, but he says that "nothing formal" has been agreed yet.
Source: Flight International
