DUBAI (Reuters) – Emirates will hold talks with Boeing over the delays to its 777X jetliner before and during this month’s Dubai Airshow, the state-owned airline’s chairman said on Monday.
The airline has repeatedly lambasted Boeing this year over the twin-engined jumbo, which is at least three years behind its originally planned arrival.
Asked by Reuters if Emirates would hold talks with Boeing at the five day air show that starts November 14, Sheikh Ahmed bin Saeed Al Maktoum said: “There will be a discussion…before and during the air show.”
Emirates last month warned that the uncertainty would cause significant disruption for one of the world’s biggest carriers, with its President Tim Clark saying then he did not know when the first of the 126 777X jets Emirates has ordered would arrive.
Emirates is a launch customer for the 777X which it will use to replace the 777 jets that are the backbone of its all-wide-body fleet. Boeing had orginally planned to deliver the 777X in June 2020 but is now targeting late 2023.
In April, Sheikh Ahmed said that some of the 126 777X jets ordered could be swapped for smaller Boeing 787 Dreamliners.
Emirates already revised its order for the 777X in 2019, cancelling orders for 24 of the jets as part of a deal that saw it agree to buy 30 Dreamliners.
Sheikh Ahmed, a senior member of the Dubai’s ruling family, also told reporters at a Dubai news conference that he expected to see “good deals” for civil and military contracts announced at the air show, without disclosing details.
He declined to say if Emirates would make any announcements.
The biennial show, this year’s biggest aerospace trade show and a spectacle for business deals worth billions of dollars, will take place from Nov 14 to 18 under capacity restrictions due to the coronavirus pandemic.
(Reporting by Alexander Cornwell; Editing by Shri Navaratnam, Kirsten Donovan)
