Singapore Airshow: airlines ‘crying out loud’ for planes amid supply crisis

As commercial aviation giants converge in Singapore this week for a biennial air show, the region’s robust aviation growth and supply chain delays remain top of mind for the sector.Experts and industry insiders at the air show told This Week in Asia that bottlenecks remained a bane for commercial aviation giants Boeing and Airbus, with airlines in the region eager for more supply to tap the region’s potential.According to Reuters, the Asia-Pacific region is the world’s fastest-growing region for air travel, propelled by China and India, with passenger traffic growth of 7.3 per cent projected for 2026, but plane makers and engine manufacturers are struggling to keep up with demand for fleet expansions.Preliminary figures released by the Association of Asia Pacific Airlines (AAPA) last month showed airlines in the region carried a combined 390.5 million international passengers last year, a 9.4 per cent increase from 2024.AAPA Director General Subhas Menon told This Week in Asia: “Asian airlines, or at least our members, are crying out loud for another supplier on the horizon.”Menon noted that state-owned Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China (Comac) provided some reprieve in the industry long dominated by Boeing and Airbus, but the sector was going through a “supply chain crisis”.“Every now and then there’s a bit of a hiccup in the supply chain, but we’ve never seen anything this bad,” said the outgoing director general.