Sao Jose Dos Campos — I’ve arrived here in Brazil and I’ll be heading to the Embraer factory within the hour and I’ve been pondering quite a bit on the state of the global economy.
This last week brought us the first new wide-body aircraft type (Delta’s 777-200LR) introduced in the US since Northwest first added its A330s in 2003. The last five years have demonstrated a tectonic shift in the center of gravity of the global economy. Around the world new wide-body aircraft are being delivered to the Middle East and Asia. You need only look at the ramp in Everett to see how things have changed.
With the US economy teetering on the edge of recession, the rest of the world largely goes on without significant impact. The full extent of the credit crisis yet to be seen, however the damage resulting from a crisis originating in US is far more contained. Yet, if markets sneeze in China the US nearly flips on its head. Indeed a role reversal indicative of the new global economy.
With respect to business aviation, emerging markets are driving product development. Here in Brazil this shift is evident, as the business jet offerings from Embraer are designed with the growing Middle Eastern and Asian market in mind. Marketing materials tout range charts from Dubai and Beijing along side London and New York.
These products will further shrink an already flat world enabling infrastructure development along side blistering economic development. The new products are an outgrowth of an economic boom, yet, at some point the question becomes one of the chicken and the egg. Will these new business jets encourage growth or be the byproduct of it?
More from Sao Jose dos Campos later.
This post was originally published to the internet between 2007 and 2012. Links, images, and embedded media from that era may no longer function as intended.
This post originally appeared at Flightglobal.com from 2007 to 2012.