Embraer entered the Paris Air Show on a roll last month and exited with a flourish, signing orders for fourteen 118-seat 195s with Flybe and twenty 190s with GECAS. The Brazilian company also found a new route to India with a preliminary commitment for two Embraer 170s and three 175s from start-up airline Paramount Airways. Flybe plans to replace its fleet of aging BAe 146 quad-jets with the Brazilian twin, scheduled for delivery from August next year through November 2007. The $470 million contract also includes options for another 12 airplanes.

GECAS plans to take the first of its 20 airplanes by the middle of next year. Paramount Airways plans to take the 170s directly from Embraer and lease the 175s from GECAS. Based in Coimbatore in southern India, Paramount supplants Jet Airways as Embraer’s first Indian customer after that airline failed to act on an MOU it signed during the 2002 Farnborough Air Show.