“Lingang New Area must build an open civil aviation industrial ecosystem and an international collaborative innovation system to, develop and guarantee domestically produced large aircraft and civil aviation engines, and realise independent control of core technologies and key links in the supply chain,” said the Shanghai government, quoting an unnamed representative from the Hi-tech Industry and Science and Technology Innovation Department of the Lingang New Area management committee.

Beijing has touted the development of Lingang New Area, which is located in the southeast tip of Shanghai, as the new driving force of hi-tech investment from foreign companies, with it already home to Tesla’s Gigafactory 3.

Washington has tightened its hi-tech exports to China to control the flow of sensitive technologies, with particular concerns surrounding potential uses by the Chinese military.

China wants to become more self-reliant in the production of commercial aircraft engines, airborne systems and raw materials in order to break the duopoly of Boeing and Airbus.

The C919, which is designed to compete with the Boeing 737 and Airbus A320, is expected to be certified by the end of the year, however, many of the key components are still supplied by firms in the US and Europe.

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China, Russia unveil model of joint venture passenger plane at Zhuhai Airshow

China, Russia unveil model of joint venture passenger plane at Zhuhai Airshow

China’s other project, the CR929, has been in the works since the collaboration between Comac and Russia’s United Aircraft Corporation (UAC) – the state-owned aerospace and defence company based in Moscow – in 2018.

Comac and UAC announced their initial cooperation in 2014 and formed the China-Russia Commercial Aircraft International Corporation (CRAIC) joint venture in 2017.

A year later, the group said it would either use General Electric from the US or Britain’s Rolls-Royce to supply the engines for the CR929.

But Ray Jaworowski, senior aerospace analyst at Forecast International, said that there is still potential for significant domestic sales of the CR929 in both China and Russia as well as to other neighbouring countries in Asia

“In the years ahead, strong economic and air traffic growth in China promises a burgeoning market for new airliners. Barring trade complications, some of this demand will be met by aircraft from Airbus and Boeing, but the market will be sizeable enough to find room for the CR929. Sales opportunities might also be found in Africa and Latin America,” Jaworowski said.

Richard Evans, senior consultant at Ascend by Cirium, believes long-haul markets are not likely to return to pre-Covid-19 levels until 2024.

“This will be reflected in higher storage levels for widebody aircraft, and continued low numbers of new deliveries. Widebody freighters are an obvious exception to this. This pattern seems set to apply to China too, given the almost complete lack of international travel at present,” said Evans.

Evans added that the potential for the CR929 to take on Boeing and Airbus in the global aviation market will also be contingent on the competitiveness of its engine and how successful the C919 will be when it eventually comes into service.

“It seems likely that the CR929 will be powered by current-generation engines, probably the GEnx [by General Electric] or the Trent 1000 [by Rolls-Royce] as used on the 787. However, by the early 2030s, it is quite likely that the 787 and A350 could see product improvements that could include new or significantly enhanced engines, keeping them a step ahead of the CR929,” Evans said.

“Perhaps if the C919 proves to be highly successful in service in China, with good experience of product support, and competitive numbers for daily utilisation, dispatch reliability etc, this might change [the growth of sales of CR929 in other markets].”