Boeing and Japan’s All Nippon Airways (ANA) announced an order for up to 20 new 787 aircraft valued at $5 billion as list prices.  After no orders in January, the February 25 announcement is a boost for Boeing and brings ANA commitment to 100 different 787 versions.

ANA was the launch customer of the 787 Dreamliner after placing its initial order in 2004. Since then the Japanese carrier is the world’s biggest 787 operator with 71 airplanes in its fleet and 12 more to be delivered prior to the latest agreement.

The new deal will bring eleven additional 787-10 airplanes to their fleet, plus one extra 787-9.  As part of the deal ANA has taken options for five more 787-9 jets.  Deliveries will start from 2022/2023 onwards.

ANA Executive Vice President Yutaka Ito said, “Boeing’s 787s have served ANA with distinction, and we are proud to expand our fleet by adding more of these technologically advanced aircraft. These planes represent a significant step forward for ANA as we work to make our entire fleet even more eco-friendly and further reduce noise output.”

ANA plans to use the 787-10 as the perfect replacement airplane for their 777 models used on domestic routs and that are coming up to retirement.  All Nippon remains the launch customer for the 777X, which recently started test flights.

As part of the deal, ANA announced that General Electric’s GEnx-1B engines will power the new aircraft.  Like Air New Zealand with its 2019 order, ANA is switching from Rolls Royce to GE and running a mixed engine fleet.

In 2018, ANA cancelled hundreds of lights because the Rolls Royce engines on their 787 fleet required extra inspections.  An ANA spokeswoman said, “As the 787 becomes a larger share of our fleet size, we have made the decision to diversify some of the components to minimize single source risks.”