China focused on 150-seat jets

China’s Commercial Aircraft Corp announced Wednesday that it will focus on making 150 seat airliners.

• The corporation Monday said it won its first overseas regional-jet order, worth about $750 million, from General Electric.
• The plane, the first Chinese regional jet, costs about $30 million, said Chen Jin, general manager for marketing and sales.
• The ARJ21, with 70 seats, is a step in China’s hope to develop an aircraft industry able to compete against Boeing and Airbus in the global market.
• According to Jim Eckes, managing director of Indoswiss Aviation, a consulting firm, the deal may also help General Electric win contracts in China.”GE is doing business with China,” he says. “If they didn’t, they probably couldn’t sell engines.”
• China started using Boeing and Airbus planes in 1972. Since then, it has spent about $30 billion on buying and renting more than 500 planes.