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Bombardier: What Went Wrong and a Plan for Success

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Currently, Bombardier Aerospace’s outlook is looking grim, and with the cancellation of the CSeries just days ago, the company’s future is in doubt. But what led to this sudden feeling of demise? Backtrack to the early 1990s, where anyone who thought that Bombardier wasn’t going to experience life long, uncontested success, was considered to be crazy. That’s because at the time, the world’s third largest commercial aircraft manufacturer was flying high on success.

A CRJ, the once proud flagship of a currently beaten up manufacturer, Bombardier.

A few years earlier, it had just made four very lucrative deals that would launch Bombardier’s aerospace division. By acquiring de Havilland Canada, Canadair, Shorts Brothers and Learjet, the company was in a very good position to capture the business and regional aircraft markets by storm. With the addition of de Havilland, Bombardier gained the Dash 8 series turboprops, which have since been a very successful regional aircraft family, and has expanded to include the new Q400 turboprop, which is undoubtedly the best in its class. With the purchase of Canadair, Bombardier gained the highly acclaimed CRJ series regional jet, which was a fierce competitor in its class as well. It seemed as if Bombardier was the strongest regional aircraft manufacturer out there, and not many people had ever heard of the small Brazilian manufacturer, Embraer. But in the mid-90s, things began to slip away from Bombardier.

In the mid-90s, Bombardier took an aggressive move and began planning out a series of larger regional jets, aimed to fill the 80-120 seat void and replace aging jetliners like the Fokker F70/F100s, and the BAe 146s. This program, entitled the BRJ-X (for Bombardier Regional Jet eXpansion), was meant to be another addition to the already diverse line-up of this proud Canadian company. Similarly, Embraer of Brazil launched their own counter-offensive, called the E-Jets, which was meant to cover the 70-110 seat range. Sometime during the earlier phases, Bombardier’s management decided that the BRJ-X was too much of a risky venture, and instead they opted to just stretch the CRJ into 70 and 90 seat platforms. Embraer, however, kept with their program, knowing that although they would be second to the market, they would have the more efficient and more comfortable jetliner. Only time would tell who would be right…

An artist’s impression of Bombardier’s BRJ-X.

Bombardier’s CRJ700, a stretched variant meant to compete with the E-Jets.

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