- [Woman] (speaking in foreign language)
- [Narrator] From airshow
to test flights in extreme cold weather
China state-owned aircraft manufacturer Comac
has been ramping up the development
of its C919 passenger jet to compete with Boeing and Airbus.
- C919 is an important part of China's
national development strategy
- [Narrator] Though the project is years behind schedule,
Beijing is moving ahead with big plans
at a time when the Coronavirus
has upended the aviation industry around the world.
Last December Comac began the process
of certifying the C919 for commercial operations.
- The large economies have not recovered
as quickly as China
and therefore China's likely share
of future commercial aviation growth
is gonna be somewhat higher.
- [Narrator] Eventually the government hopes the C919
will become the main carrier in the world's biggest
commercial aviation market, but can it succeed?
Chinese President Xi Jinping has had an aviation dream
since he took office in 2012,
to build the country's first commercial civilian airliner.
- (in foreign language)
- [Narrator] For the past two decades,
Airbus and Boeing have benefited
from China's fast-growing commercial aviation market.
Airbus built an assembly plant in China in 2008.
And before the pandemic, a quarter
of all Boeing planes that came off the assembly line
went to China,
and the demand isn't going away anytime soon.
According to Boeing's latest market outlook
from this past October, it expects China to buy
more than 8,400 new airplanes over the next 20 years
with the market valued at a total
of more than $1.7 trillion.
- Is that very good economic reason
for China to want to build its own aircraft.
And that is so that it can fill that market
and save a huge amount of it.
- [Narrator] Timothy Heath is a defense researcher
who's been studying China's national aviation strategy
for more than 15 years.
- [Timothy] The problem is that due to it's
lack of experience, there's a very steep learning curve.
- [Narrator] For instance, compared to Boeing's
more than 100 years of experience,
China started exploring commercial aviation in the 1970s.
So to catch up the Chinese government has been focused
on Comac, which was only established in 2008,
according to the US think tank
The Center for Strategic and International Studies
since Comac's early days it has received
somewhere between $49 and $72 billion in government aid,
far more than the $22 billion that Airbus has received
from European governments,
according to the World Trade Organization.
Heath says while support from Beijing
has helped build successful homegrown companies
and industries, including 5G and artificial intelligence.
It'll take more than money to help the C919 take off.
- The difference is that civilian airliner manufacturers
is an order of magnitude more difficult
then a cell phone technology
and handheld consumer electronics.
- [Narrator] That's because building a commercial aircraft
requires hundreds of thousands of components.
- Their individual components,
which are ridiculously difficult to make
because you have to make them perfectly.
And they have to work
at 35,000 feet in the air for hour upon hour,
land, gas up, and do it again with no problems.
- Scott Kennedy is a senior advisor
at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
The non-profit policy research organization receives part
of its funding from some governments
and corporations including Boeing.
Kennedy has been analyzing China's industrial policy
for more than 25 years.
- Most of the parts that the Chinese make
are in the interior or for elements
of the body or the doors.
So the Chinese components are relevant to the plane
but they're not central to the plane's ability to fly.
- [Narrator] The more complex parts are imported.
- [Scott] China depends almost entirely on the US and Europe
for the components that go into the plane from the engine,
to the avionics, to the materials,
to most of what's inside the plane, even.
- [Narrator] According to Kennedy's analysis
only 14 key suppliers are from China
and half of them are joint ventures with foreign companies.
And these joint ventures are one important part
of Comac's plans to advance technologically.
- The Chinese have actually required a support suppliers
to transfer technology in many cases.
That means the Chinese are absorbing technology
and they're learning how to make some of the components.
- [Narrator] But for years,
Western manufacturers have acted to protect their IP
by only supplying old technology.
- It's already an obsolete plane
cause you've been using the oldest
most out of date technology
because the companies don't want to share and give away
their most cutting edge, valuable technologies.
- [Narrator] Still the Trump administration
kept an eye on joint ventures,
concerned that forced technology transfers
could allow China to break into the global jet engine market
and undermined US businesses.
- Then a world of heightened diplomatic tensions
that are growing more severe by the day.
One has to question whether those diplomatic tensions
could eventually bring a project like the C919 to a halt.
- [Narrator] For instance, in early January
the Trump administration added Comac to a list of companies
it says support China's military.
This blacklist could ban Americans
from supplying the plane manufacturer.
Comac didn't respond to a request for comment.
It's uncertain how political tensions will change
during the Biden administration.
But Kennedy says the success of Comac will take longer
than one presidential term.
- Despite all of the state support
and the history of China overcoming
previous technological hurdles.
I still think that we're no closer
then a decade away from Comac being a serious competitor
to Boeing or Airbus.
- [Narrator] Until then China will need to rely
on their jets.
But when the C919 is ready it potentially
has a guaranteed market at home
since Beijing could order it's state-owned airlines
to buy the plane in large numbers.
According to Kennedy's analysis, Comac already had more
than 1,000 orders by the end of 2020.
- These orders have been on the books for a long time
but those numbers on orders are really smoke
and mirrors until they really can prove
that they can deliver and service planes on a regular basis.