CO and UA Order Book

CO and UA have a total of 161 aircraft on firm order backlog (data from Ascend's fleet database). CO has 41 single-aisle aircraft on order--all 737NGs--and UA has 42 Airbus A319/A320s on order--consistent with their installed base of aircraft.

There is better commonality on wide-body aircraft as both airlines have 787s on order although UA has an order for 25 Airbus A350-900XWB.

CO tends to have a fleet dominance of single aisle aircraft (86% of their mainline fleet is made up of narrow-body aircraft with only 14% wide-bodies). However, 41% of their firm order book is comprised of twin aisle aircraft, a significant shift from their current fleet inventory. UA fleet orders, on the other hand, are basically an even split of single aisle and twin aisle aircraft (46% NB, 54% WB).

Is there a future scenario where CO becomes the domestic airline and UA becomes solely international as a merged entity?

With Continental and United in the news about a potential merger, here is a quick rundown of their aircraft fleet (in-service as of the end of April, fleet data from Ascend).

As the blue highlighting shows, there is very little in the way of aircraft type commonality on both the single-aisle and twin aisle aircraft. Generally, CO is a Boeing shop (thanks to Gordon B.; Boeing must have been pretty good to Gordon as he has been quite loyal to his former employer) while UA is an Airbus customer (for single-aisle aircraft); both CO and UA like Boeing for twin-aisle airplanes, at least those in service today.

Also interesting is the engine mix. Again, very little commonality in terms of engine manufacturers: United is strong PW and IAE customer while CO is GE/CFM and to a lesser extent Rolls-Royce.

Having said all of this, it is clear that merger dynamics trump any issue of aircraft/engine commonality--it did so in the DL-NW merger as well. In the end, the lack of commonality (and any issues surrounding it), are simply 'details' that someone other than senior management can solve.

I will get to an analysis of what they have on order, shortly.