Will It Be Hard For Embraer To Sell Aircraft Without A Major Partner?

Embraer E2 medium-range airliner
Credit: Embraer

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Embraer’s third-quarter revenues were down 63% from a year earlier, and a deal to sell its commercial aviation unit to Boeing has fallen apart. Given its financial troubles, won’t it be difficult to sell aircraft without a major partner?

Aviation Week & Space Technology Editor-in-Chief Joe Anselmo answers:

We posed that question to Embraer CEO Francisco Gomes Neto. His answer: “Embraer does not need to be saved.”

Gomes Neto told Aviation Week the company has secured financing from Brazil’s development bank and others that should provide 2-3 years’ of liquidity. That should be enough to see the Brazilian company through the COVID-19 downturn and onto a path to recovery. He also led a new financial plan that aims to make Embraer’s operations leaner and more agile.

That said, the company is reeling from the one-two punch of COVID-19 and Boeing’s last-minute decision to scuttle the commercial partnership. Gomes Neto says Embraer is looking for new partners in commercial aviation “to open new markets, production, services and products.” But the company will not sell a controlling interest in a unit, as it (almost) did with Boeing.

Embraer also is dusting off plans to develop a new turboprop aircraft and is looking for partners to help fund development. On the military side, the company has a modern, new product in its C-390 transport. And looking to the future, it is developing a hybrid-electric light aircraft for the Brazilian military.

Many challenges lie ahead. It will be interesting to see whether new partnerships emerge—and where those partners come from. You can listen to our complete interview with Gomes Neto here: Embraer’s CEO on the Breakup With Boeing and Going It Alone.

Joe Anselmo

Joe Anselmo has been Editorial Director of the Aviation Week Network and Editor-in-Chief of Aviation Week & Space Technology since 2013. Based in Washington, D.C., he directs a team of more than two dozen aerospace journalists across the U.S., Europe and Asia-Pacific.

Comments

1 Comment
"The company will not sell a controlling interest" in the company. If it made sense to do this before with Boeing why does it no longer make sense now?