AgustaWestland is a total capability provider in the vertical lift market. In an interview with SP’s Aviation, the company shared details on its performance at the show.

SP’s Aviation (SP’s): How was the show for you this year?

AgustaWestland: For AgustaWestland, Paris Air Show 2013 has been a great event confirming the positive trend experienced in years attending primary, world-class exhibitions and events. AgustaWestland announced contracts valued at approximately 335 million euro for about 50 helicopters with orders placed by customers worldwide. Regarding market opportunities across Asia, contracts for commercial helicopters in India, Republic of Korea and a distributorship agreement in China are worthy of mention.

SP’s: Did the tricky weather disrupt or affect your business interactions during the show?

AgustaWestland: Not at all.

SP’s: Can you indicate which specific innovations were introduced by your company at the show?

AgustaWestland: We attended the Paris Air Show with a strong focus on the following subjects:

• For the first time the innovative AgustaWestland family of new generation helicopters was showcased in the static area. All the three models, the AW189 the AW169 and AW139, were successfully part of important orders.
• For the first time the innovative all-electric tilt-rotor Project Zero was showcased by AgustaWestland, gaining an incredible success of public and media alike.
• AgustaWestland provided an insight of its customer support and training capabilities in order to demonstrate its commitment to our present and future customers.

SP’s: Which programme of your company is the most innovative one today and what kind of transformation will it bring in the market, once available for potential users?

AgustaWestland: AgustaWestland has been putting in the market two new helicopters, the AW189 and AW169. The former is already setting a new standard in the long-range market and the latter is the first brand-new light intermediate category helicopter in decades. Together with the AW139, they are both part of AgustaWestland family, a concept introduced for the first time ever in the helicopter market. These helicopters possess the same high-performance flight characteristics and safety features while sharing the same common cockpit concept and design philosophy. This approach facilitates synergies for operators of more than one of these models in areas such as training, maintenance and support, resetting the rules in effective fleet management. This outstanding concept has quickly found global market success among several major operators and various contracts have been announced at the Paris Air Show 2013 confirming this positive trend.

SP’s: Which part of the world looks like the most promising market at this point of time and why?

AgustaWestland: Fast growing economies are showing a significant range of opportunities AgustaWestland is ready to exploit, offering its products, locally supporting customers and partnering with local players. Depending on specific market requirements, a number of applications are being targeted such as offshore, VIP/corporate, the wide range of public utility roles (law enforcement, EMS/SAR) and government. In many cases our dual-use product approach offers cost-effective solutions for parapublic and military requirements. AgustaWestland is actively participating in a number of joint ventures and collaborative programmes in all the continents. Russia, China, India and Brazil, all show huge potential and AgustaWestland has a well-established presence in all of these countries. Additionally, the Middle East proves extremely important.