Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications
Thursday, Apr 28, 2005
Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications Thursday, Apr 28, 2005 |
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Airlines Airbus wants CVC to look into AI's acquisition deal Our Bureau
New Delhi , April 27 A DAY after losing the 50 aircraft acquisition proposal of Air India (AI) to arch-rival Boeing, the European aircraft manufacturer, Airbus Industrie, today called for sending all the papers connected with the acquisition deal to the Central Vigilance Commission (CVC). "We are questioning how the evaluation was done. We feel it was not fair and are astonished at the decision. It is a massive blow to us. We hope to have a meeting with AI and will try and call its board members. We trust that the Government will look at the entire process in a dispassionate manner," the Airbus Vice-President, Sales, India Subcontinent and South Asia, Mr Nigel Harwood, said. The AI board late on Tuesday approved a proposal to purchase 50 Boeing aircraft, including 27 Boeing 787 aircraft in a deal valued at more than $ 6 billion. Airbus officials claimed that though the European manufacturer had wanted to make a presentation to the airline they were not given an opportunity that was provided to the competing manufacturer. "We were not given fair and equal treatment. We were not given a chance to make a presentation on the Airbus A-350 whereas Boeing made their case on the B-787 that will not fly for some more years. This goes against the tender conditions,'' he claimed. Furthermore, Mr Harwood claimed the AI board had chosen the Boeing 787 with a nine-seat configuration instead of the internationally accepted norm of eight seats. "We are delighted with the transparent manner in which Indian Airlines (IA) deal (which went in Airbus's favour) conducted. But in AI we were not allowed to present the facts," Mr Harwood claimed. The Airbus official claimed that the company would not mind losing a deal over price, but said that the AI deal was not "strictly an apple-to-apple competition". Terming the loss of the AI order as a "massive blow" Airbus officials admitted that the loss would see Boeing "nudge" past the European aircraft during the first four months of the current year. "There are still eight months left in the year and it is difficult to say what the impact of the AI order will be on us. It is still too early to say what the final result will look at by the end of the year," Mr Harwood said. When asked whether it was lobbying from the US that led to the deal being bagged by Boeing, Mr Harwood merely said: "As a company we feel there was lobbying but there is no solid evidence."
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