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DUBAI : The biennial Dubai Airshow ended on Thursday, fulfilling pessimistic analyst forecasts, as sales of only a bit more than 14 billion dollars dimmed against 155.5 billion dollars in 2007.
"The declared on-site order book for Dubai Airshow 2009 is now over 14 billion dollars (9.3 billion euros)," the organisers' website said, with final figures expected to be released in the coming days.
European aircraft manufacturer Airbus walked away with the highest share, with orders and letters of intent to buy planes worth 5.3 billion dollars.
The Airbus orders were for 15 aircraft worth more than 3.6 billion dollars, in addition to memorandums of understanding on another 18 valued at around 1.7 billion dollars.
"We had a good airshow, better than many expected," said Airbus chief operating officer John Leahy on Wednesday.
But this year's figure paled against the 2007 show, when Airbus received its largest-ever single order valued at 20 billion dollars from Dubai's Emirates.
Airbus's US arch-rival Boeing lagged behind, making only two announcements worth not more than 800 million dollars.
Boeing received orders from the Algerian national carrier Air Algerie for seven Boeing B737-800s. The price was not disclosed, but it should range between 493 million dollars and 553 million dollars according to catalogue prices.
Boeing also confirmed an order for four B737s by the Algerian domestic carrier Tassili Airlines, valued at 228.4 million dollars.
The armed forces of the United Arab Emirates placed two orders worth 700 million dollars for Swiss basic-training planes and Swedish early warning jets.
Airbus and Boeing took orders for some 458 new aircraft worth around 75 billion dollars in the previous show. That was mostly from Gulf carriers, who kept a low profile this year.
Even so, some of these carriers continue to be major clients on the order books of Airbus and Boeing as they await delivery of aircraft ordered over the past few years.
Dubai's Emirates, the largest Middle East carrier, has placed orders for 156 planes from both manufacturers, according to its website. Emirates remains the largest single client of Airbus's superjumbo A380 with 58 planes, of which it received four.
Abu Dhabi's Etihad, established only in 2003, ordered 55 aircraft from Airbus last time, while Qatar Airways, says on its website that its firm orders and options amount to 93 planes from Airbus and 89 from Boeing.
"We see tremendous growth for the Middle East region," Randy Tinseth, vice president of marketing at Boeing Commercial Airplanes, said on the sidelines of the show.
Airbus chief Tom Enders also acknowledged that the Middle East is weathering the turbulence in the global aviation market well.
"I think this show is encouraging ... to see that there is growth, particularly in the Middle East, (and) Africa," he said.
Ahead of the show's opening on Sunday, Morgan Stanley Rupinder Vig had predicted that it would be "much more low key than the last few years."
Another analyst, requesting anonymity, said "the small contracts that will be made public during the show will not have an impact on stock exchanges."
- AFP /ls
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