EVA Airways discussing purchases with Airbus

EVA Airways Corp (長榮航空), Taiwan's second-largest airline, is in talks with Airbus SAS on buying aircraft as it upgrades its fleet to meet rising travel demand.

"We've always been in talks with Airbus," Nieh Kuo-wei (聶國維), a spokesman at Taoyuan-based EVA, said in a phone interview yesterday.

He denied an Economic Daily News report that the company will soon complete a deal with Airbus.

"Nothing has been decided," he said.

The Evergreen Group (長榮集團), in which EVA is a unit, plans to buy at least 12 Airbus A320 passenger aircraft for more than US$700 million, the newspaper reported. The planes will be used for domestic and regional routes, according to the report. EVA currently has 10 Airbus planes out of its fleet of 51 aircraft.

Asian airlines are upgrading their fleets with more fuel-efficient planes amid record jet kerosene prices. Some carriers are also expanding to cater to increasing demand for overseas air travel by tourists from China, South Korea and Japan.

Australia's Qantas Airways Ltd, Singapore Airlines Ltd and Hong Kong's Cathay Pacific Airways Ltd are all considering new plane orders from Airbus and Boeing Co to upgrade and expand their fleets.

EVA ordered 15 Boeing 777-300ER and 777-200LR planes in 2000 and April last year valued at US$3 billion, taking delivery of them beginning this year. The airline is in talks with Boeing on a US$2 billion order of 10 Boeing 777-200LR airplanes, EVA said in June.

Demand for air travel rose in the first eight months of the year, with Taiwan's residents making 5.69 million overseas trips, or 7.4 percent more than last year, according to government statistics. Taiwan received 2.2 million visitors from abroad during the same period, 16 percent more than a year earlier.