Airbus Secures Record 150-Plane A220 Order With AirAsia in Multi-Billion Dollar Boon for Quebec Aviation
Share
Airbus Canada has signed a deal to supply AirAsia with 150 of its Canadian-made A220 jets in a multibillion-dollar coup for Quebec's aviation industry. The agreement with the low-cost Malaysian airline marks the largest single firm order for the narrow-body planes — assembled north of Montreal in Mirabel — in the manufacturer's history.
Lars Wagner, who heads the commercial aircraft division at Airbus, said the deal underscores Quebec's role as a key hub in global aviation. Airbus bought a majority stake in the Bombardier C Series program in 2018 and rebranded it as the A220. The Mirabel assembly line has since become a cornerstone of Canada's aerospace manufacturing sector.
Question
Why does a 150-plane order from a Malaysian airline matter for Canada's economy and trade strategy?
Editor's Comment
This is a meaningful industrial win for Canada—especially Quebec—because it validates Mirabel as a globally relevant production hub and supports Ottawa’s push to diversify trade beyond the U.S. That said, the commercial reality is execution: Airbus still needs to lift A220 output materially to hit break-even, and supplier constraints (engines, wings) are exactly the kind of bottlenecks that can turn a headline order into delayed deliveries and cost overruns. For the broader economy, the combination of this order plus new federal and provincial spending signals a deliberate strategy to treat aerospace as a long-cycle jobs anchor and a geopolitical asset, but the payoff depends on whether Mirabel can reliably scale production.