Airbus to pitch for slice of Chinese market

Chinese President Hu Jintao will on Thursday visit the headquarters of European aircraft manufacturer Airbus in the French city of Toulouse where company officials will bid for a larger share of the growing Chinese market.

China is likely to become another venue for fierce competition between Airbus and US rival Boeing.

An Airbus spokesperson said that although the company had a smaller presense than Boeing, China was a very important market to it.

The company plans to sell more than 800 aircraft in China over the next 20 years, and Airbus is set to pitch its future super jumbo jet, the A380.

Although 129 orders have been placed for the future double-decker jet, which will carry around 550 passengers, none was from a Chinese airline, who have so far preferred Boeing.

Airbus currently holds around 30% of the Chinese market.

In April last year, Airbus signed a contract for 30 of its A320 and A330 models and on January 14 the Chinese national carrier Air China announced that it was going to order eight Airbus aircraft this year.

The European airplane maker last year delivered 305 commercial aircraft to Boeing's 282, eclipsing its US competitor for the first time in its history.

The manufacturer also disclosed earlier this month that it had exceeded its underlying profit target in 2003 by 15%.

But the news was overshadowed on the stock market by fears the group would receive no orders from the United States this year.

Airbus officials have already warned that the commercial aircraft market would continue to face challenges in 2004 and have predicted a slight decline in deliveries over the next 12 months compared with 2003.