Embraer expands portfolio in US$ 1.5 billion in the 1st quarter
Gazeta Mercantil - 04/09/2008
The 36 units of the new EMBRAER 195 aircrafts sold to the new Brazilian Air Company, owned by David Neeleman, gave record impulse in the sales portfolio of the Brazilian Company of Aeronautics (Embraer). The company published its backlog for the segments of commercial, executive, defense and government aviation, whose increase registered this year's first quarter was US$ 1.5 billion. Now, Embraer totals US$ 20.3 billion in firm orders, once again the highest value in history. Today, the commercial sector of the company has 509 confirmed purchases and another 915 options. In the first quarter 45 units were delivered, from which 38 were commercial jets and seven were executive airplanes. The production continuity is in line with the goals for the 2008 fiscal year. The company's management confirmed that it will deliver between 195 and 200 jets, in addition to 10 to 15 executive Phenom 100 jets. This will bring a new production record to Embraer, which closed last year with 169 jets delivered. The biggest acquisition in these first three months was made by the new Brazilian operator, still without a definite name and that will be the pioneer in operating Embraer's jets in the national airspace. Besides the sales made to entrepreuneur Neeleman, which still appear in the published balance as «undisclosed customer», sales contracts for other customers such as Air Moldova, Jetscape and Régional were registered. Besides those, EgyptAir Holding Company, Finnair, and M1Travel bought Brazilian jets. In this period, the JetBlue airline company confirmed another three purchase options, totaling 104 aircrafts in its firm order. However, US Airways ended up cancelling 10 firm purchase orders, which were transferred to the position of options according to the contractual clause. Those sales had been published in February of 2006. The executive jets of the Phenom family continued to show significant sales results, already exceeding the amount of 750 firm negotiations. Embraer communicated that the Phenom 100's certification program proceeds according to the schedule established ny the multinational's engineering department. The airplanes have four functional prototypes in operation in the test required by the certificanting agencies.