Russia "has new economic possibilities" to gain a greater share of the global market for civilian passenger and transport airplanes and "keep its leadership in producing combat aircraft," Putin said at the opening of the Moscow Air Show. More than 780 domestic and foreign producers from 110 countries are participating in the biennial event, Putin said yesterday at the once-secret Zhukov airfield near the Russian capital.

Russia, the biggest arms supplier to developing countries, plans to manufacture and sell 4,500 civilian and military planes worth US$250 billion (HK$1.95 trillion) over the next 18 years, Alexey Fyodorov, chief executive of Unified Aircraft Corp, said last week. By 2025, annual output will reach 300 airliners, 100 transport planes and more than 100 combat aircraft.

Indonesia was scheduled to sign a contract worth as much as US$350 million for six Sukhoi Su-30 fighters, said Valery Kartavtsev, a spokesman for the Russian state arms exporter Rosoboronexport.

"Unified Aircraft Corp plans more active entry into the world market for competitive civilian and transport aircraft," Putin said, referring to the new state holding company for designers and manufacturers whose chairman is First Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov.

Unified Aircraft is Putin's effort to restore Cold War production levels and compete with France-based Airbus and Chicago-based Boeing. Russia has orders valued at as much as US$8 billion for combat jets and expects to boost the airliner backlog to US$3.5 billion this year, from US$1.5 billion.

Russian aerospace companies made 26 civilian planes last year, the Industry and Energy Ministry said. Airbus has delivered 269 planes so far this year and Boeing has shipped 253. Russian carriers have imported and contracted hundreds of jets from the West in the last decade.

Russia's aviation industry survived after the Soviet Union collapsed, primarily by exporting Sukhoi and MiG fighter jets. Commercial aviation is the top focus now, Fyodorov said.

Unified Aircraft will start a "profound" modernization of Ilyushin-96 and Tupolev-204 long-haul and mid- range aircraft and develop a regional Superjet-100 and a passenger airliner similar to the Airbus 320, Fyodorov said. Unified is holding preliminary "consultations" with Airbus on the possibility of joint development of such an aircraft, with production to begin in 2015. The company expects to identify "concrete" ways to cooperate with Airbus's parent, EADS, by the end of this year, Fyodorov added.

Russia has committed 18 billion roubles (HK$5.43 billion) in state support for the industry over the next three years, including assistance to overhaul manufacturing facilities.

State-run Aeroflot, eastern Europe's biggest carrier, last month agreed to buy 22 Airbus and 22 Boeing jets. BLOOMBERG