DUBAI - ALAFCO Aviation Lease and Finance Company (KSCC) has completed an agreement to purchase 12 firm, eight option Airbus A350 aircraft powered by the GEnx engine.
The GEnx engines for the firm 12 A350s are valued at more than $300 million. Delivery of the aircraft, a combination of A350-800 and A350-900 models, is scheduled to begin in 2012.
Based in Kuwait, ALAFCO is a growing aviation lease and finance company with customers in Asia, the Middle East, and Europe.
"GE is most pleased to support ALAFCO's aircraft expansion activity," said Scott Donnelly, president and CEO of GE - Aviation. "We are confident that the GEnx will bring excellent economic performance to ALAFCO’s new fleet of A350s."
The GEnx is based on the highly successful GE90 architecture. It will succeed the CF6 engine family, which is GE's most reliable and best-selling engine on wide-body aircraft.
The GEnx provides significantly better fuel burn and payload performance than GE's CF6 engines. It is the world's only jet engine with a front fan case and fan blades made of composites, which provides for greater engine durability, weight reduction and lower operating costs. The fan blades will utilize GE90 composite technology that has performed remarkably well on GE90 engines, with no in-service issues for almost a decade. The GEnx will operate with 18 fan blades (50 percent fewer than the CF6) at noise levels lower than any large GE commercial engine currently in service. The GEnx also features a new combustor for efficient fuel mixing before ignition, resulting in significantly lower NOx levels.
The GEnx is part of GE's "ecomagination" product portfolio--GE's commitment to develop new, cost-effective technologies that enhance customers' environmental and operating performance.
The first full GEnx engine will go to test in 2006, with engine certification scheduled for 2007.
GE - Aviation, an operating unit of General Electric Company (NYSE: GE), is one of the world's leading manufacturers of jet engines for civil and military aircraft. GE also is a global provider of maintenance and support services for operators of GE jet engines.