Honeywell predicts 4,000 civil helicopter deliveries over the next five years

Aviation systems manufacturer Honeywell estimates that 4,000 aircraft will be delivered to the civil helicopter market between 2019 and 2023.

A new forecast revealed at HAI Heli Expo today that 4,000 new civilian helicopters will be delivered globally over the next five years. This is a 200 aircraft drop off from last year’s five-year forecast which reckoned on 4,200 helicopters delivered from 2018 to 2022.

Honeywell cites an inconsistent economic outlook for key international markets.

Heath Patrick, president, Americas aftermarket, Honeywell Aerospace said: “Despite positive impacts of U.S. tax reform on new helicopter purchase plans in North America, an inconsistent economic outlook for international markets has resulted in lower purchase plans worldwide from fleet managers when compared with a year ago.

“Honeywell remains focused on bringing innovation to the market by delivering avionics, monitoring systems and connected helicopter technologies that boost a platform’s efficiency and availability.”

Despite the drop-off in deliveries, the forecast also revealed that approximately 20% of US respondents to a Honeywell survey said that fleet utilization is expected to increase over the next twelve months.

Additionally, purchase plans by law-enforcement and oil-and-gas operators are higher than last year’s estimations, although purchase plans from corporate operators are lower. There are higher proportions of new medium twin-engine and lower-light twin-engine helicopters.

New helicopter platforms are expected a three to four percent growth in bookings over the five-year period. The forecast rounds off predicting moderate growth for the industry over the five-year period and an “overall healthy outlook”.

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