Bombardier Says Business Jet Financing Challenging

The financing situation for the purchase of business jets is difficult, the president of Bombardier Aerospace said at the Paris Air Show on Tuesday.

"It's very challenging right now," Guy Hachey said. Overall, following a sharp increase in order cancellations for its aircraft, "things are certainly bottoming out," he said. "We feel we are at the bottom."

Hachey added that he believed air travel would recover from the current slump.

"Right now, obviously, things are slow," he said. "We are seeing some little indication that things are picking up," Hachey said, adding that it will likely be in "two to three years that things will pick up."

Hachey said Bombardier hoped to win "one or two" more orders this year for its new CSeries aircraft, which it plans to build to take on the single-aisle models of dominant rivals Boeing and Airbus.

"We are working with a deep list of potential customers (for the CSeries)," Hachey said, though he added that Bombardier would not announce any orders at this week's air show.

The CSeries currently has two customers.