Bombardier chief executive Alain Bellemare fired back today at Boeing’s recent move to initiate an anti-dumping trade dispute against the CSeries programme.
“We believe this action could have a serious impact on airlines, the travelling public, innovation and competition in the aerospace industry,” says Bellemare in his opening remarks on a first quarter earnings call with analysts.
Bombardier only entered an “under-served” market for 100-seat-class aircraft after Boeing decided to exit the segment, he says.
“Boeing would prefer airlines to buy larger aircraft based on older technology,” Bellemare says. “That approach may be better for Boeing, but it is worse for everyone else.”
The CSeries also should create “billions of dollars of exports” for American suppliers on the CSeries programme, Bellemare says.
In his opening remarks, Bellemare did not directly address the issue at the core of Boeing’s petition filed last month with the US International Trade Commission, which accuses Bombardier of unfairly lowering CSeries well below manufacturing costs based on access to billions of dollars in alleged subsidies from the Canadian government.
Those subsidies, including loans to help launch the programme in 2008 and $2.5 billion in investments by provincial and federal government entities, helped Bombardier win the Delta Air Lines deal for 75 CS100s, Boeing says in the petition.
Source: Cirium Dashboard
