Originally Posted by
Tech Guy
Does anyone think Embraer are in a position to launch a larger passenger aircraft to compete with the 737? The C-390 is similarly sized to the smaller 737 varients and is a considerably newer and more advanced design. I am not saying the C-390 airframe is suitable for this purpose, just that Embraer obviously have the skills and capability to produce a modern aircraft of this size. With Boeing being very much on the back foot, timing could be very favourable to them.
Let us assume for a moment that Boeing have truly dropped the ball re the 737 refreshes, and the 737 replacement product, vs the A320 family refreshes from Airbus. Let us assume that one is either a very senior person at Boeing (or their bondholders) or in the potential sources of competing product (Embraer, Comac, GD, Silly Valley .... Austin, etc) or their major stakeholders in Beijing, Sao Paulo, etc, and of course the engine companies and their associated nation-state golden share holders (or equivalents).
If so - then it is worth reading the latest entries in the (mis-named) EVTOL thread. Specifically they are regarding a Delft/etc conceptual design for a 76 tonne (76,000 kg) x 90-seat propellor driven BEV aircraft with a 1,000 km (LHR-ATH) range and a 2030s launch date possibility that would take about 1/3 of the potential marke (19% - 52% depending on how you count, see Fig 10 in the Delft study).
EVTOL news and progress - do we need a new dedicated section?
https://pure.tudelft.nl/ws/portalfil..._90_seater.pdf
There are also related discussion going on regarding the commercial viability and the volume scalability of the drop-in liquids eSAF and bioSAF on the one hand; the growth of high speed rail networks on the other hand; the unlikelihood of a hydrogen future; and the rapid growth in all things virtual and bandwidth/latency-related including whatever is called telepresence, virtual worlds, or whatever on any given day of the week.
So .... against this background, how would any potential new entrant manage the market entry risk associated with a fossil-fuel-powered narrowbody jet when there is one perfectly decent one available (A320-series) and two that are in various forms passable (737 and 919) if one is prepared to accept other 'issues'. Assuming one was technically successful in negotiating the project risks in bringing a cleansheet A320-series competitor to market in (say) the early 2030s, then how would one lock-in commercial success early enough so as to guarantee a good economic result by (say) mid-2030s when all the other pressures might completely restructure the market in favour of entirely different solutions.
These are the issues that any serious board looking at such a concept will likely be grappling with. Taking on the high risks of being just a 'me-too' new entrant as a A320-peer are one thing. Doing so just at the same time as high-bypass turbofans get supplanted by entirely different thrust devices with entirely different energy sources; or when the demand for travel goes through some major qualitative and quantitative shift entirely; is an entirely different class of risk.
I accept that for some types of competitor (i.e. nation-states) these may be acceptable risks for reasons of access to other value streams. But for mere commercial entities I suggest this is not a good reason to step forwards unless one is holding a gold-plated cost-plus contract.
Tell me, at what energy density does a 2,000-km range become attractive. If you can tell me that, I can tell you how many years wide your window of opportunity is to launch a commercially-funded conventional fossil-driven high-bypass ratio turbofan medium-range single-aisle*. Then you can judge whether you feel lucky.
(* my guess is a 5-10 year window, no more, until 1,000-1,200 Wh/kg cell densities are available, i.e. mid-to-late 2030s, almost certainly by 2040)
In the 1950-2020 period lots of stuff happened in jet airliners and the associated travel industry, but the main technologies increasingly focussed onto high-bypass. Now is a moment when that design paradigm may no longer hold true. It takes a brave business to launch a new 'conventional' product into such a market.