The production of A330/A340 is also being increased to almost 100 a year, the recently-promoted vice-president sales (India & Africa) Dr Kiran Rao said. Passenger traffic is expected to double in the next 15 years and almost treble in 25 years, according to estimates by Airbus Industries.

Meanwhile, Airbus has drawn the roadmap to operationalise its A3XX from 2005, whose commercial launch took place in June this year.

Aimed at trunk routes, A3XX will have a capacity of 555 seats with a speed of 8,150 nautical miles while the A3XX freighter will have a capacity to carry 150 tonnes and a speed of 5,620 nautical miles. Air France, Emirates and ILFC have already signed up for A3XX while a few others have publicly expressed interest, Dr Rao said. Airbus forecasts a market for some 1,200 airliners in the A3XX size category over the next 20 years as well as 300 freighters in the category above 80 tonnes. Airbus has spent around $1 billion on developing A3XX and it will carry a catlogue price of $230 million.

Airbus Industries is also not worried on the observations made by the Delhi high court which stated that the government should not have any deal for new aircraft with Airbus Industries of France unless it provides information on the Rs 4,200-crore deal for the purchase of 31 planes in 1986 in which kickbacks were allegedly received by some middlemen. "We are not going to speculate on what might or might not happen. Observations made by the Delhi high court were meant more for the French government than for Airbus Industries," Airbus officals later said.