Making his first appearance at a European Regions Airline Association conference since assuming the top executive spot from the outgoing Filippo Bagnato, new ATR CEO Patrick de Castelbajac issued a predictably upbeat assessment of his company’s performance of late during a press briefing in Barcelona on October 1. Now holding, by its reckoning, an 80-percent share of the 70- to 80-seat turboprop airliner market, ATR expects a renewed emphasis on Europe following its encouraging sales over the past few years in Asia, whose operators now fly the highest numbers of the Franco-Italian turboprops of any region in the world.

De Castelbajac noted that turboprops in Europe average 14 years of age, creating a potential backlog of demand on the continent not seen since the company re-emerged from its doldrums roughly a decade ago, when regional jets held sway on both sides of the Atlantic.

Still, he noted that, today, conditions remain “tough,” as Western Europe continues to suffer from sluggish economic growth. For ATR, however, worldwide sales have more than compensated for Europe. In the first half of this year alone, it sold 144 airplanes, representing 150 percent of its total sales in 2013. De Castelbajac does not see that kind of performance continuing into next year, however, not least because the company can’t promise to deliver airplanes before 2017.

All told, he estimated roughly 1,700 sales over the next 15 years for ATR, equating to nearly 115 airplanes a year. Looking toward 2015, he said he expects a sales total more typical of its projections. “It won’t be as good as this [year],” he conceded. “You can’t have a year when you sell almost twice the production, and the year after you continue to sell as if nothing happened. So I believe sales next year won’t be at the same level as this year.”

ATR’s current in-production models are the 600 series 70-seat ATR72s and 50-seat ATR42, featuring the new Armonia cabin design.