Airbus announces C series partnership with Bombardier

Oct. 17 (UPI) -- Airbus announced plans to partner with Bombardier on its C series aircraft program.

The agreement, which was described as a "win-win" by Airbus CEO Tom Enders, was signed Monday, bringing together Airbus's global reach and scale with Bombardier's state-of-the-art jet aircraft family.

"The C Series, with its state-of-the-art design and great economics, is a great fit with our existing single-aisle aircraft family and rapidly extends our product offering into a fast-growing market sector," Enders said.

"I have no doubt that our partnership with Bombardier will boost sales and the value of this program tremendously."

Under the agreement, Airbus will provide Bombardier with procurement, sales and marketing, and customer support expertise to the C Series Aircraft Limited Partnership, which manufactures and sells the C Series aircrafts.

Airbus will acquire 50.01 percent of the program, leaving Bombardier with about 31 percent and Investissement Quebec with 19 percent.

Although the partnership's main assembly line and headquarters will remain in Quebec, Canada, Airbus announced it would also expand the C Series production to Alabama.

The partnership could affect the United States' plans to move forward with trade sanctions against Canadian-made jets. The agreement could get around the sanctions by producing jets made in Alabama.

Boeing, which has dealt with trade issues with Airbus, voiced concerns about the partnership.

"This looks like a questionable deal between two heavily state-subsidized competitors to skirt the recent findings of the U.S. government," Boeing said in a statement. "Our position remains that everyone should play by the same rules for free and fair trade to work."

The transaction is still subject to regulatory approvals and completion of the agreement is expected in 2018.