The first Chinese airline Air China announced on Thursday, July 12, it will firmly order 20 further Airbus A350-900. Including its initial ongoing order, the airline will possess a total of 30 aircraft of this type. The order of 20 further units is worth $6.54 billion at catalogue price and the deliveries will be carried out between 2020 and 2022. Air China has announced it will secure the rights to convert five of its A350-900 in A350-1000, the larger version of Airbus’ wide-body.

The 20 additional aircraft should enable Air China to increase its capacity by 9.7 percent. Air China’s A350-900s have a tri-class configuration of 312 seats: 32 seats in Business class, 24 in Premium Economy and 256 seats in Economy. They are based in London, Milan, Frankfurt, Munich and Singapore and Paris CDG as of August 1.