An Egyptian airline is expected to sign a contract with Russia’s Sukhoi Civil Aircraft Company (CJSC) next month for 10 Superjet 100 short-haul passenger planes, Sputnik reported on Tuesday.
"I think that we are going to substantiate the agreement. It is all about financing now," said Vladislav Masalov, the vice president of the state-run United Aircraft Corporation (UAC).
The Russian news agency Tass reported that the sale of 10 Sukhoi Superjet 100 planes to Egypt could be finalized before the end of the Q1.
Tass quoted Masalov as saying, "The deal concerns four aircraft on lease and six optional ones.” He also noted that protocol of intentions with the Egyptian Air Leisure airline was signed on February 2.
Russian Industry and Trade Minister Denis Manturov earlier said that negotiations with EgyptAir on the supply of 40 SSJ-100 planes were in progress.
“We are currently negotiating [with EgyptAir] the possibility of supplying up to 40 SSJ-100 aircraft. This is a big, ambitious project that will ensure loading of our production capacities for the near future. Of course, this depends on many factors, in particular, the financial terms that we will be elaborating with our financial institutions.
"But most importantly, there is the good will and interest and a clear-cut program concerning which aircraft will be replaced in this case by our SSJ-100," he said.
Tass added that Russia’s UAC earlier planned to transfer to EgyptAir 12 SSJ-100 aircraft for trade-in with an option for 12 more jets. A trade-in option for 15 Embraer-170 aircraft was also discussed with the Egyptian airline.
A total of 64 SSJ 100 aircraft are currently in service, according to Sukhoi Civil Aircraft (SCA) data, Tass added. The largest aircraft operators are Aeroflot, Mexico’s Interjet and Gazpromavia.
