Airbus finds buyers for AirAsia’s cancelled A320neo

Airbus (AIB, Toulouse Blagnac) has reportedly placed all six A320neo Family aircraft not taken up by AirAsia (AK, Kuala Lumpur Int’l) earlier this year with other customers, Reuters has reported. The last of the sextet was placed with another airline at the end of November, sources said. Airbus put the six aircraft up for auction in April 2020 after the Malaysian low-cost carrier resolved to pause its fleet growth in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic. In October, the European manufacturer said it had 135 aircraft built but not taken up due to various COVID-related changes in airlines’ fleeting strategies. AirAsia is one of Airbus’s largest customers with outstanding firm orders for thirteen A320-200Ns and 349 A321-200Ns, on top of thirty and two units of the respective types already delivered to the Malaysian carrier and a further thirteen A320-200Ns and two A321-200Ns operated by AirAsia Group’s units in India and Thailand. Only India’s low-cost carrier IndiGo Airlines (6E, Delhi Int’l) has more A320neo on order from the manufacturer. AirAsia X (D7, Kuala Lumpur Int’l) is also the largest A330-900 customer with orders for 78 units, as well as for thirty A321-200Ns and ten A350-900s.