Honeywell Aerospace Forecasts $343bn of Business Aircraft Deliveries to 2035

Honeywell Aerospace forecasts $343bn of new business aircraft to be delivered between 2026 and 2035, according to the outlook it published on 19 October. The company says the figure also counts turboprops and personal jets for the first time. 

The 35th annual Global Business Aviation Outlook came out on the eve of the NBAA-BACE show in Las Vegas. It is the first since Honeywell Aerospace was spun off as a separate listed company on 29 June. The report puts deliveries at 9,950 business jets and 4,200 turboprops. Honeywell Aerospace expects the global fleet to grow from about 39,400 aircraft in 2025 to nearly 51,000, and flight hours to rise by 34% by 2035.

Honeywell’s release says its delivery forecast is 4.4% higher than last year’s. The comparison leaves out the turboprops and personal jets added this year, Aviation Week reported. Honeywell provides no like-for-like figure for the wider total, so the $343bn cannot be compared with last year’s forecast of $283bn.

Of the 306 operators surveyed, 32% plan to increase flight hours in 2027, up four percentage points on last year’s survey. The share planning to log fewer flight hours also rose by two percentage points to 11%.

The Connectivity Bill

Connectivity “will become increasingly important” in the region, Cooper Cullen, Honeywell Aerospace’s president for Europe, the Middle East, Africa and India, said in a release issued in Dubai on 20 October. Honeywell Aerospace’s answer is JetWave X, a satellite system on Viasat’s network that features in the outlook’s closing pages. The company aims to have it certified in 2026 on midsize to large-cabin jets from Bombardier, Dassault, Embraer, Gulfstream and Textron, as well as Boeing’s BBJ 737.

It is pitching the system to Gulf operators after SpaceX raised Starlink’s prices for all its business-jet customers in August. Starlink’s unlimited plan now costs $12,500 per month within one continent and $20,000 per month for worldwide coverage.

Starlink allows business-aviation customers to cancel their subscriptions at any time, but does not expressly offer fixed monthly rates. After announcing price increases in July, it automatically moved existing subscribers to the new plans from their first billing cycle after 7 August.

Viasat is taking a different approach. Pointing to operators “navigating unpredictable pricing elsewhere in the market”, its president of aviation, Don Buchman, has emphasised price certainty. From 1 January 2027, Viasat’s suggested retail prices for JetWave X service will be fixed for the length of each contract. They are only suggestions, though: its resellers, Collins Aerospace, Gogo and Honeywell, set what operators actually pay.

The Middle East

Honeywell’s global report does not show the Middle East separately. It counts the region in a group it calls the Rest of the World, along with Asia-Pacific, China, India, Africa and Australia. In the report’s regional breakdown, this group holds 12% of the world’s business fleet and accounts for 9% of deliveries.

Honeywell says the group shows the highest purchase interest among all groups in the survey. Its report puts the share of the group’s operators with at least one new aircraft on firm order at 52%, up 16 percentage points from last year and about twice the share in North America or Europe.

Honeywell’s description of the region has changed since last year. Its 2025 outlook said the Middle East was “poised for growth” as regulatory changes and better airport infrastructure would make it easier to operate there. Honeywell’s release this year says “the ongoing conflict in the Middle East has paused development and disrupted regional flight operations”. It adds that the region “remains a center for premium aviation services”. The Dubai release said business-jet departures had more than doubled in the UAE over five years, and risen 42% in Saudi Arabia.

Kevin Schwab, Honeywell’s strategic planning manager, told AIN that the region’s growth “was not temporary by any means”. He pointed to recent improvements in infrastructure and regulation in the UAE and Saudi Arabia: “These are long-term plans and long-term investments.”