Originally Posted by
ParrotBay031
The XLR launch date is sometime in 2023 which really means 2024. I also saw in an article it saying that they wanted these airplanes to be new orders not rollover or exchange orders because of the funding for the R&D for the program. So my guess is we will place an order for these as the launch customer, how it was tied into the a220 deal. I think they have known about this for a while, and why we are doing europe in a 3 step process. LR for London/Ireland to start seeing how successful it is, XLR for Germany, France, Italy and if all is successful an eventual wide body 330 order to go into deep Europe to places like Greece, Sweeden, Finland, Maybe Israel and also using these planes to go into deep south america and maybe even Hawaii.
Airbus WANTS additional incremental orders, in order to justify the R&D. That would never guarantee JB would feel any pressure by that desire.
With that said, JB has reached the point of it's existing order books that they NEED an additional order on the books or they will risk a delivery gap at the end of this current NEO order as Airbus deliveries are now full for many years.
Even with that being the case, if they place an aircraft order along with the XLR (assuming it happens), you will likely see the XLRs as a CONVERSION of the existing order (for better delivery slots) and an incremental order for deliveries after the existing NEO order.