Originally Posted by AllYourBaseAreB

It didnt cost a lot of money

The C-Series was selling poorly and widely regarded as a commercial flop. Airbus became a partner for peanuts to act as a stability booster. Then Boeing being Boeing lobbied to get ridiculous import duties imposed after the Delta order. Bombardier practically gave away the operation because it was a money loser at the time and Airbus could move production to the USA to avoid import duties.

Also, Airbus started with the midsize version of the 320 series in 1988, then the biggest in 1994 (321), then went small in 1996 (319), then smaller in 2003 (318)… defying historical precedence