Biggest Airbus A320neo buyer IndiGo considers slowing deliveries

IndiGo, the biggest customer for Airbus’s A320neo jets, is considering slowing deliveries of the single-aisle aircraft to give supplier Pratt & Whitney more time to make improvements to the model’s engines. The Indian carrier may seek the delivery slowdown “to allow Pratt & Whitney to catch up on the production of upgraded engines,” InterGlobe Aviation, which operates the airline, said Monday in its fiscal first-quarter financial statement, without providing details. IndiGo’s A320neo order at Airbus totals 430 planes, with the first aircraft handed over last March. The carrier, which has a contract with Pratt to provide power systems for the first 150 planes, said earlier this year it would consider switching to rival CFM International Inc.’s engines for later orders. IndiGo President Aditya Ghosh declined to say whether the airline would shift to the CFM models for the first batch of aircraft. “The A320neo operations continue to be a challenge,” Ghosh said on a conference call with analysts. “We are struggling with maintaining our schedule integrity and our technical dispatch reliabilities at the same level” as the plane’s predecessor model, the A320ceo. Even so, IndiGo is sticking to a target of operating 24 A320neos by the end of March 2017. It currently flies five of the planes. Stefan Schaffrath, an Airbus spokesman, declined to comment, saying IndiGo is still taking deliveries of the planes.<br/>