“The aircraft manufacturer aims to tap into the growing demand for narrow-body aircraft in the Asia-Pacific, including Malaysia, as the country aspires to be a major aerospace hub in the region by 2030,” said Villaron.

He noted that there is a growing interest among airlines in the region for regional jets or narrow-body aircraft such as E-Jets, which have a capacity of 70 to 150 seats.

“In addition, the Embraer E-Jets are city airport specialists and are prevalent in city airports around the world. Its low noise emissions make the E195-E2 perfect for flights in and out of the Sultan Abdul Aziz Shah Airport in Subang,” he said.

Currently, he said Embraer has close to 20 operators in the Asia-Pacific, collectively operating around 200 E-Jets in the region and these airlines are based in countries such as China, Japan, Australia, India, and Vietnam.

In 2024, he said the company expects to welcome Singapore’s Scoot and SKS Airways in Malaysia as the airlines start to operate their latest generation E190-E2 and E195-E2 aircraft, respectively.

“As such, we see opportunities for our footprint to grow further with rising demand,” he noted.

On global risk, he said inflation and rising costs have placed greater pressure on airlines to watch their operating costs and cash flow.

“Increasingly, airlines will look to having efficient aircraft in their fleet that will enable them to grow their network while keeping operating costs and cash flow in check,” he said.

The International Air Transport Association anticipates the airline industry’s net profits to reach US$25.7 billion (RM119.08 billion) in 2024 on a 2.7% net profit margin.

The total revenues are expected to grow 7.6% year-over-year to a record US$964 billion (RM4466.60 billion), while 4.7 billion people are expected to travel this year, a historic high that exceeds the pre-pandemic level of 4.5 billion recorded in 2019, it said.