Supersonic aircraft maker keen to set up facility in Qatar

Boom Technology, the US-based developer of supersonic passenger airliner designed to fly nearly two-and-a-half times faster than the conventional aircraft, has expressed its keen interest to set up a production facility in Qatar to manufacture the jets.
This was announced by Blake Scholl, Founder and CEO of Boom, who was here to introduce the supersonic passenger airliner as well as the XB-1 Supersonic Demonstrator, at a press conference.
“The first factory will be in the US, close to the engineers currently working on the programme, but we will need a lot of production facilities to supply an estimated demand of over 1300 Supersonic passenger aircraft. And Doha, being a hub of Qatar Airways, would be one of the best places to setup a factory,” Blake told The Peninsula.
Once operational, the commercial supersonic aircraft will connect the GCC, including Qatar, to the rest of the world with flights up to 2.6X faster than conventional airliners.
For example, a flight from Doha to Sydney which takes 14 hours today, will take just eight hours and 25 minutes flying Supersonic. In the same fashion, Doha to New York which takes13 hours and 55 minutes today, will take just 7 hours and 25.
Based in Denver, Colorado, Boom Supersonic is using state-of-the-art aerospace technologies to deliver a revolutionary speedup in travel.
Compared to Concorde, designed in the 1960s, Boom will be 80 percent less expensive to operate—leading to affordable tickets for passengers and profit opportunities for airlines. Key technologies for supersonic include carbon fiber composites, advanced aerodynamics, and modern turbofan jet engines. These technologies combine to enable an airplane faster than Concorde, yet quiet, efficient, and comfortable for passengers.
 Blake Scholl, Boom Founder and CEO, said: “Qatar has one of the world’s fastest-growing airlines which leads the world in travel experience. We are delighted to bring in innovative transportation technologies and introduce Boom to Qatar where tourism is burgeoning. ”
The Boom airliner seats up to 55 passengers in comfort and privacy. Cruising at 60,000’, passengers experience less turbulence. Looking through the largest windows in commercial aviation, the sky is a deeper blue and one can see Earth’s curvature.
The Boom’s XB-1 Supersonic Demonstrator, a ⅓ scale prototype aircraft, is under construction now and will fly in 2018. Passenger flights will begin in the early 2020s.
The XB-1 Supersonic Demonstrator will fly with hardware from General Electric (engines), Honeywell (avionics), Tencate (carbon fiber), with composite structures fabricated by Blue Force. Final assembly and vehicle integration are taking place in Boom’s facility at Centennial Airport near Denver, Colorado.
Asked if Boom would continue to source engines from existing suppliers, which are facing issues with some conventional aircraft manufacturers, Blake said: “The first airplane flies with GE engines. But we haven’t announced it who is building for the production of aircraft yet. There are multiple parties who are interested. But it (engines) would be slightly modified from the existing ones.”