Airbus SAS is confident of securing a firm order for four A380 superjumbos before the end of March from Skymark Airlines Inc., as it seeks to use the discount carrier to pry open the Japanese market.
Skymark, which operates a fleet of 15 Boeing Co. 737 aircraft on domestic routes, aims to use the double-decker Airbus to connect Tokyo with London. Airbus aims to get a firm commitment from Skymark by the end of the first quarter, according to Kiran Rao, the Airbus executive vice president for sales and marketing in Asia.
"Japanese culture lends itself to the A380," Rao said in a telephone interview Monday. "If you look at the way that airlines operate the A380, you'll see that one of the first markets they all went into is Japan."
While the world's largest passenger aircraft makes regular appearances in Japan with airlines including Deutsche Lufthansa AG, Airbus has struggled for decades to establish a presence similar to that of Boeing in the country. All Nippon Airways Co. came close to ordering A380s in 2008, only to pull out amid financing concerns as the global economy contracted, Rao said.