British Airways' Citiflyer Express has placed a firm order for six new Avro RJ100 airliners valued at $180 million, with options for six new RJX-100 regional jets.

The RJX options represent the second commitment for the new aircraft; launch customer Druk Air in Nepal ordered two of the four-engined jets earlier this year. The six firm RJ100s will be delivered between November 2000 and April 2001, increasing Citiflyer's RJ100 fleet to 16 aircraft.

Nick Godwin, BAE Systems marketing VP, says the company is undergoing a "challenging" transition between Avro RJ and RJX production, and ten RJ100s remain to be sold.

"We expect to sell all the RJ100s by first quarter 2001-all are covered by commercial agreements," he says." We're anticipating one major fleet order for the RJ100 in Europe, and two or three follow-on orders."

Godwin sees strong interest for the RJX in the European market, but not in the U.S., where issues of pilot unions and scope clauses have hitherto precluded efforts to sell larger regional jets.
"It's really quite ridiculous," Godwin says. "The world's largest free market is controlled by pilots, producing a black hole between 50 and 100 seats. In a way, Europe is a more advanced RJ market, since it already uses larger aircraft."

Though the RJX is slower than the competition (.72 Mach vs. .80 Mach), and has four engines instead of two, Godwin is confident that the plane's larger cabin and customer acceptance will win it orders.
"But the most important point is that we'll hit the market sooner," he says. "None of the other 90-seaters-except for the CRJ900-will enter the market before 2004. We'll be in service in September 2001."

By Paul Richfield