HAL to make spare parts for Boeing 777

HAL, which has other ongoing joint projects with the Seattle-based aeronautical giant, will produce as many as 300 pairs of the assembly, with an estimated cost of $4.5 million, Keskar said. Delivery is expected to begin in March 2000, continuing through 2006.

“This work package is a clear message that business for Boeing means opportunity for suppliers and industrial partners it counts as part of its extended enterprise,” he said. Boeing is also looking at the India’s corporate market to sell itslatest Boeing Business Jet which can fly 14 hours non-stop.

“We are pleased to see India returning to the aviation horizon,” Keskar said of the Boeing’s interest in a resurging private sector which had collapsed within years of India’s opening its skies to competition in 1991.

He said Boeing was negotiating with aircraft carriers in India to sell its short-haul 717 passenger jets. “There is an emerging market in India for 100-seater planes and we are now talking to the authorities,” he said.

The US firm had established a clear lead over its rival the European consortium Airbus Industrie in India, where as many as 16 planes sold in the past nine years belonged to Boeing.

Boeing and Airbus are locked in a dogfight to secure a $2 billion deal to sell at least 23 Medium Capacity Long Range (MCLR) passenger jets to Air India. Air India, however, is facing a massive resource crunch and is not in a position to place an order.