Brazil-based global major aerospace group Embraer has reported that it has secured export financing of up to $600-million for the next four years. The company is the world’s number one manufacturer of commercial airliners with 150 seats or less. It stated that the loans had been obtained at market interest rates.

Half the financing will be provided by Brazil’s National Bank for Social and Economic Development, with the other half coming from a consortium of banks. Half of the banks in this consortium are State institutions and the other half are private-sector banks. 

The Brazilian newspaper Folha de São Paulo stated that the purpose of arranging the loan was to send a signal to the markets of Embraer’s “vitality”. Embraer itself described the financing as reinforcing its cash position and ensuring funding from production through to the shipment of the product to the export customer.

The manufacturer is currently having to deal with both the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic and Boeing’s withdrawal from their planned (and almost concluded) joint venture (JV). Covid-19 has severely affected the global airline industry, but so far Embraer has only had to change delivery dates for its aircraft. None of its orders have yet been cancelled.

As a result of the cancellation of the Boeing JV, Embraer now has to reintegrate its commercial aviation (airliner) business back into the group. (It had been separated out because it was the subject of the JV.) This reintegration  process started on June 15.

That same day Embraer also announced that, with immediate effect, Arjan Meijer had been appointed the new president and CEO of Embraer Commercial Aviation, replacing John Slattery. Meijer had been chief commercial officer for Embraer Commercial Aviation since the start of 2017. Slattery, who had worked for Embraer since 2012, left to take up the position of president and CE of GE Aviation in the US (reported UK website FlightGlobal, the online edition of Flight International).