Rockwell Collins Forecasts Market Bottom in 2010
Deliveries of turbine-powered business airplanes will continue to fall through the end of next year before beginning a slow but steady recovery in 2011, ac

Deliveries of turbine-powered business airplanes will continue to fall through the end of next year before beginning a slow but steady recovery in 2011, according to a market forecast released on Friday by avionics maker Rockwell Collins. Slightly more pessimistic than predictions from market analysts JP Morgan, Merrill Lynch and UBS, the Rockwell Collins business aviation outlook projects that around 600 turbine business airplanes will roll out of factories next year, with the market remaining relatively flat in 2011 and 2012 before rebounding to pre-recession levels in 2013. The market will again be setting all-time delivery records by 2017, according to the forecast, which includes business jets and turboprops, but not VLJs. Rockwell Collins predicts that OEM orders will start improving early next year, while aircraft backlogs will start to rise toward the end of 2010. The company also predicts that flight activity will begin picking up next year as corporate profits turn positive. Keys to the recovery, the company said, will be the health of the broader economy, the timing of pre-owned inventory “burn down,” the rate at which OEM backlogs grow and future oil prices.