C-27J makers confirm commitment to area

There is no 'magic number' of planes that need to be ordered, a Boeing spokesman said.

By TIMOTHY J. GIBBONS, The (Florida) Times-Union

At a news conference in Paris today, the team behind the C-27J cargo plane will reconfirm its commitment to Jacksonville in the near future.

The announcement comes on the heels of an interview in which the lead company in the group intimated that U.S.-based production of the aircraft might not begin until 2012 or later.

Bob Drewes, president and chief operating officer of L-3 Communication Holdings' integrated systems unit, the prime contractor for the cargo plane program, told Dow Jones Newswires that it was unclear when Boeing Co. will begin manufacturing the plane.

Boeing has committed to doing final assembly of the aircraft at a facility at Cecil Field, the former military base on Jacksonville's West Side where the city has long hoped to house aviation-related manufacturing operations.

The new conference at the Paris Air Show "will re-emphasize that Boeing is moving out this year and will intend to build the first airplane in 2009 and 2010," Boeing spokesman Rick Sanford said Monday.

Since the Pentagon announced last week that the team of L-3, Boeing and a subsidiary of Italian manufacturer Alenia had won the contract, the companies have been saying that the first two aircraft would come from Italian factories while Boeing works to set up the facility at Cecil Field.

Sunday, Drewes said that the work will not begin in Jacksonville until sufficient quantities of airplanes are ordered. The Pentagon has said it would buy two of the aircraft this year and four next year, with the annual production run increasing to 19 planes each in 2012 and 2013. The five-year, $2 billion contract for 78 planes runs out that year.

"There's no magic number. Maybe it's over 20 a year, something like that," Drewes was quoted as saying.

On Monday, however, an L-3 spokesman said talks between the two aircraft manufacturing partners on the team were still ongoing. "This is a negotiation between Alenia and Boeing," said spokesman Jason Decker.

Alenia did not return calls for comments, with an employee saying everyone authorized to talk was unreachable in Paris.

The city has been close to getting aircraft manufacturers to set up shop at Cecil in the past, with Brazilian aircraft company Embraer saying in 2004 that it planned to build jets there. The first U.S. military contract the company won, however, fell through, and Embraer has yet to begin operations here.

Jacksonville Aviation Authority spokesman Michael Stewart, one of several authority employees in Paris for the air show, said he could not comment on the timing issue before the news conference, although the authority remains "cautiously optimistic."

"The really exciting part is everyone here thinks this is the airplane of the future," he said.