China plans to produce its own large commercial jet by 2020 to challenge the dominance of Airbus and Boeing in the world's fastest-growing aircraft market, the state media reported today.
Beijing has accelerated the development of a homegrown passenger aircraft to compete for the billions of dollars it is spending on foreign planes.
The blueprint for the large aircraft project will be completed by 2010, according to the Xinhua news agency, which highlighted the national prestige attached to the government-funded plan.
Europe has lost billions pursuing this prestige project, whose initial goal was supposedly to create more competition in the airliner business. Since Airbus took off, both Lockheed and McDonnell Douglas have gotten out of the jetliner business, creating less competition, not more.
Japan explored this industry in the 80's and decided they couldn't make money doing it. Maybe China has money to burn.
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