Norwegian Air to lease Boeing 787s for long-haul routes
Norwegian Air Shuttle AS, Europe's fourth-largest discount carrier, agreed to lease two Boeing Co. 787 Dreamliners from International Lease Finance Corp. as part of its plan to add long-haul routes.
Norwegian Air will take the 787s on 12-year lease from the fall of 2012 and is in the final stages of talks to add as many as six more, it said today. The carrier already has 63 short- haul Boeing 737s on order after adding 15 to a contract in July.
Chief Executive Officer Bjoern Kjos plans to start flights from Oslo and Stockholm to Bangkok and New York in the second half of 2011 and will add about 15 long-distance routes over the next few years. The Boeing 787 was chosen over Airbus SAS's A350 after the Fornebu-based company held talks with both suppliers.
“This is an important milestone for Norwegian as we have now decided to use the Dreamliner for our long-haul operations,” Kjos said in the statement, citing lower fuel consumption and improved passenger experience as factors in the selection.
Norwegian Air was trading up 8.5 kroner, or 8.6 percent, at 107 kroner as of 5:07 p.m. in Oslo, paring the decline this year to 7 percent. Founded in 1993, the carrier has focused on European flights since switching to a discount model in 2001. Dublin-based Ryanair Holdings Plc is Europe's biggest low-cost airline, followed by EasyJet Plc of the U.K. and Air Berlin Plc.
ILFC, the largest lessor of jet aircraft, is Boeing's biggest customer and has an order for 74 787s. Norwegian Air also has a leasing deal for four Boeing 737s with the Los Angeles-based company, it said today.
Boeing postponed delivery of the $178 million Dreamliner for the sixth time on Aug. 27 after Rolls-Royce Group Plc was unable to supply an engine to complete testing, and the first of the composite-plastic planes will now be handed over in the middle of the first quarter next year.
The Airbus A350-900 is scheduled to enter service in 2013, followed by the smaller -800 in 2014 and the -1000 in late 2015. The model has an average list price of about $255 million.