Dassault orders and deliveries down in 2019

Dassault delivered 40 business jets in 2019, one fewer than it did in 2018.

The total of 40 aircraft was five fewer deliveries than the 45 Falcons it said it would deliver in the year. It says that the drop in deliveries was due to what it describes as a “difficult market”.

During the year Dassault received 40 net orders for new Falcon business jets, two more than the 42 orders that it took in during 2018.

However, 2018’s net order intake was inclusive of an unspecified number of Falcon 5X orders.

Dassault cancelled the Falcon 5X project in December 2017 following repeated issues with Safran’s Silvercrest engines that were due to power it.

The replacement Falcon 6X, with Pratt & Whitney Canada PW800 series engines, is due to be certificated in 2022.

Dassault’s Falcon backlog at the end of 2019 stood at 53 aircraft, exactly the same as it was at the end of 2018. With 40 deliveries and 40 orders, Falcon’s book-to-bill ratio is 1-1.

Dassault only gives an overall number of deliveries, rather than breaking down deliveries into individual aircraft types.

According to the AMSTAT database, 13 deliveries were the largest model in the Falcon line up, the Falcon 8X.

Deliveries included aircraft that are now based in China, Malaysia, Nigeria and Vietnam.

Two of the smaller Falcon 7Xs were delivered to the Royal Australian Air Force, and another was delivered to the Egypt Air Force.

The French manufacturer will release its full financial results for 2019 and its Falcon delivery guidance for 2020 on February 27th.