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China鈥檚 Comac Aims to Rival Boeing and Airbus in the World鈥檚 Biggest Market | WSJ - YouTube
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- [Woman] (speaking in foreign language)
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- [Narrator] From airshow
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to test flights in extreme cold weather
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China state-owned aircraft
manufacturer Comac
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has been ramping up the development
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of its C919 passenger jet to
compete with Boeing and Airbus.
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- C919 is an important part of China's
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national development strategy
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- [Narrator] Though the project
is years behind schedule,
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Beijing is moving ahead with big plans
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at a time when the Coronavirus
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has upended the aviation
industry around the world.
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Last December Comac began the process
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of certifying the C919
for commercial operations.
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- The large economies have not recovered
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as quickly as China
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and therefore China's likely share
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of future commercial aviation growth
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is gonna be somewhat higher.
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- [Narrator] Eventually the
government hopes the C919
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will become the main carrier
in the world's biggest
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commercial aviation
market, but can it succeed?
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Chinese President Xi Jinping
has had an aviation dream
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since he took office in 2012,
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to build the country's first
commercial civilian airliner.
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- (in foreign language)
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- [Narrator] For the past two decades,
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Airbus and Boeing have benefited
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from China's fast-growing
commercial aviation market.
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Airbus built an assembly
plant in China in 2008.
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And before the pandemic, a quarter
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of all Boeing planes that
came off the assembly line
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went to China,
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and the demand isn't
going away anytime soon.
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According to Boeing's
latest market outlook
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from this past October,
it expects China to buy
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more than 8,400 new airplanes
over the next 20 years
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with the market valued at a total
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of more than $1.7 trillion.
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- Is that very good economic reason
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for China to want to
build its own aircraft.
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And that is so that it
can fill that market
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and save a huge amount of it.
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- [Narrator] Timothy Heath
is a defense researcher
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who's been studying China's
national aviation strategy
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for more than 15 years.
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- [Timothy] The problem
is that due to it's
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lack of experience, there's
a very steep learning curve.
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- [Narrator] For instance,
compared to Boeing's
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more than 100 years of experience,
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China started exploring
commercial aviation in the 1970s.
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So to catch up the Chinese
government has been focused
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on Comac, which was only
established in 2008,
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according to the US think tank
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The Center for Strategic
and International Studies
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since Comac's early days it has received
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somewhere between $49 and $72
billion in government aid,
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far more than the $22 billion
that Airbus has received
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from European governments,
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according to the World Trade Organization.
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Heath says while support from Beijing
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has helped build successful
homegrown companies
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and industries, including 5G
and artificial intelligence.
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It'll take more than money
to help the C919 take off.
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- The difference is that
civilian airliner manufacturers
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is an order of magnitude more difficult
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then a cell phone technology
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and handheld consumer electronics.
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- [Narrator] That's because
building a commercial aircraft
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requires hundreds of
thousands of components.
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- Their individual components,
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which are ridiculously difficult to make
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because you have to make them perfectly.
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And they have to work
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at 35,000 feet in the
air for hour upon hour,
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land, gas up, and do it
again with no problems.
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- Scott Kennedy is a senior advisor
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at the Center for Strategic
and International Studies.
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The non-profit policy research
organization receives part
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of its funding from some governments
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and corporations including Boeing.
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Kennedy has been analyzing
China's industrial policy
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for more than 25 years.
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- Most of the parts that the Chinese make
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are in the interior or for elements
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of the body or the doors.
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So the Chinese components
are relevant to the plane
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but they're not central to
the plane's ability to fly.
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- [Narrator] The more
complex parts are imported.
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- [Scott] China depends almost
entirely on the US and Europe
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for the components that go
into the plane from the engine,
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to the avionics, to the materials,
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to most of what's inside the plane, even.
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- [Narrator] According
to Kennedy's analysis
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only 14 key suppliers are from China
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and half of them are joint
ventures with foreign companies.
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And these joint ventures
are one important part
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of Comac's plans to
advance technologically.
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- The Chinese have actually
required a support suppliers
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to transfer technology in many cases.
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That means the Chinese
are absorbing technology
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and they're learning how to
make some of the components.
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- [Narrator] But for years,
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Western manufacturers have
acted to protect their IP
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by only supplying old technology.
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- It's already an obsolete plane
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cause you've been using the oldest
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most out of date technology
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because the companies don't
want to share and give away
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their most cutting edge,
valuable technologies.
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- [Narrator] Still the
Trump administration
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kept an eye on joint ventures,
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concerned that forced technology transfers
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could allow China to break into
the global jet engine market
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and undermined US businesses.
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- Then a world of heightened
diplomatic tensions
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that are growing more severe by the day.
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One has to question whether
those diplomatic tensions
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could eventually bring a
project like the C919 to a halt.
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- [Narrator] For
instance, in early January
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the Trump administration added
Comac to a list of companies
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it says support China's military.
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This blacklist could ban Americans
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from supplying the plane manufacturer.
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Comac didn't respond to
a request for comment.
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It's uncertain how political
tensions will change
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during the Biden administration.
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But Kennedy says the success
of Comac will take longer
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than one presidential term.
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- Despite all of the state support
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and the history of China overcoming
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previous technological hurdles.
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I still think that we're no closer
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then a decade away from Comac
being a serious competitor
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to Boeing or Airbus.
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- [Narrator] Until then
China will need to rely
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on their jets.
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But when the C919 is ready it potentially
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has a guaranteed market at home
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since Beijing could order
it's state-owned airlines
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to buy the plane in large numbers.
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According to Kennedy's
analysis, Comac already had more
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than 1,000 orders by the end of 2020.
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- These orders have been on
the books for a long time
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but those numbers on
orders are really smoke
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and mirrors until they really can prove
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that they can deliver and service
planes on a regular basis.
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