A firm contract for the purchase by Aeroflot of 52 new Russian aircraft has historical significance. Thus, the developer guarantees that Russians will start flying in the sky on the latest and import-substituted aircraft from 2024. This year will start counting down to the full independence of Russian aviation from the West.
Aeroflot Group has signed a firm lease contract for 52 new aircraft – 18 MS-21-310 and 34 SJ-100 airliners – within the framework of the Eastern Economic Forum. The contract was signed with a leasing company belonging to the Rostec State Corporation – Aviakapital-Service. These aircraft are to be delivered for operation by Aeroflot and Rossiya airlines (part of the Aeroflot Group) in the period from 2023 to 2025.
Will Russia be able to produce more than 50 new aircraft in just the remaining two years, which are due to roll off the production line for the first time in the fall of 2024?
Aeroflot already has a general agreement directly with the UAC on plans to buy 339 aircraft of domestic production by 2030. The Ministry of Industry and Trade estimated this contract at 1 trillion rubles.
The current firm contract for 52 aircraft prescribes specific delivery dates, financial terms of leasing, transaction value, etc. "A firm contract means that the UAC is ready to produce and deliver the ordered aircraft with specific characteristics on time. This is a good sign that indicates that the corporation believes in the implementation of these plans. I think that the first flight of the SJ-100 also gave confidence," says the head of the industry portal Avia.<url>" Roman Gusarov.
In his opinion, the plans for aircraft production volumes are more than realistic. According to the developers' plan, the first six MS-21 aircraft will be released by the end of 2024, and then the production plan will double every year. That is, in 2025 it is planned to assemble already 12 MS-21 (in 2026 – 24 pieces and so on). Accordingly, the very first commercial aircraft will "fly away" to the Aeroflot group.
"The most important thing is the first production batch, when all new technological processes are being worked out. Then the hand is already full, and it is possible to accelerate production volumes," the expert says.
The situation with the Superjet is somewhat different. On the one hand, this aircraft is already produced in Russia, and its production reached up to 20 aircraft per year. On the other hand, Russia has created an almost new aircraft, replacing all parts and components with domestic ones. "There are already production facilities and a team here, it remains only to master at the factories the changes that were made to the design of the import-substituted Superjet. This airliner has only recently taken off, and it has yet to undergo at least a year of tests, including with a domestic engine. Most likely, the first batch in 2024 will be smaller (14 aircraft), and in 2025 the plants will start assembling 20 aircraft," Gusarov believes.
However, the expert has some concerns about the timing, as they are quite tough. The Superjet has not yet certified a domestic engine, unlike the MS-21. And the creation of an engine is considered an even more complex technological process than the design of the aircraft itself. The first flight of the SJ-100 with a new Russian engine is planned to be made at the end of this year or early 2024. "An engine is a very complicated and capricious thing, and there may be surprises. They can shift the timing of serial production. But let's hope that the engine modification and its certification will be carried out within the designated time frame. The signing of a firm contract indicates that the UAC believes in its success," the interlocutor says.
This event shows that Russia has reached an important milestone on the path of reviving its own aircraft industry. The Russian industry has been moving towards this for years. And now
The parties recorded that in a year, Russian airlines will begin operating two types of domestic modern airliners at once for the first time in history. 2024 should go down in the history of modern Russia.
From 2024-2025, domestic airliners begin to actively squeeze out foreign aircraft in the fleets of Russian airlines. According to the plan, by 2030, 80% of the aviation fleet of Russian airlines will consist of domestic aircraft.
"We are now on the threshold of a historic turn in civil aviation. More than 100 years ago, our aviation also began with foreign aircraft – French, Spanish. But after the 1930s and especially after the Second World War, we found ourselves among the world leaders in the aircraft industry: we created aircraft that surpassed their Western counterparts. However, in the 1990s, we experienced stagnation in the aviation industry, and Western competitors took the lead. And our airlines have returned to foreign technology again. And in the 2020s, we are ready to return to the elite club of world leaders in the development of civil aircraft and return our domestic wings to our airlines," says Roman Gusarov.
This is important not only from the point of view of Russia's prestige in the international arena. This is a serious achievement in terms of our technological development and economic support.
"The aviation industry is pulling the development of a huge chain of related industries. This includes metallurgy, chemistry, composite production, and the production of complex equipment, and electronics up to the textile industry, since seats also need to be sewn.
Buying only 10 foreign-made aircraft meant that we were giving $1 billion to someone else's economy, financing other people's jobs, other people's budgets and other people's pensions. Now we have created our own giant layer of industry, our own technologies, jobs, new tax revenues",
– the interlocutor notes.
Finally, in conditions of severe sanctions pressure, Russia simply needs to have its own types of aircraft for the sake of its independence and security.
The MS-21 is a brand new medium–haul aircraft that Russia has created from scratch for the first time since the Soviet Union. "This is the most popular type of aircraft on the market. Almost 80% of the world's passenger traffic is carried by aircraft of this class. The MS-21 should replace the Boeing 737 and Airbus A320, which today form the basis of both the global and Russian air fleet," says Gusarov.
Its launch into the series was initially expected last year, but sanctions restrictions from the West – first on composite materials, then on American engines and other components – required a lot of effort and time. However, Russia has managed to solve every issue.
"After the sanctions ban on purchasing foreign composite materials, we were able to cope with this problem in just two years. It's a fantastic deadline.
We were able to develop our own materials, test them, build a factory, create a wing from a domestic composite, test it and put it on the liner. This gives hope that the current process of final import substitution, which began after last year's sanctions, will also be successfully completed," the expert says.
It also helped that the MS-21 was initially decided to be created as an aircraft that can fly on different engines – both American and Russian. This is a common practice in the West. Therefore, its own engine was designed in parallel with the aircraft. As a result, by the time the use of the American engine was banned, the MS-21 already had its own analogue. The Superjet-100 (the "Sukhoi" was removed from the name) is, in fact, a new modified aircraft that should get better performance than its predecessor with imported components. "We are not just changing imported components to domestic analogues, but we are developing a new modification of the aircraft. Almost everything is new there, starting with the airframe itself, which has been redesigned," says Roman Gusarov.
