Montreal-based Bombardier’s deliveries last year scaled up by eight units to 146 aircraft and revenues beat guidance at $8.7 billion as service revenues jumped by 16%. However, even as deliveries climbed, they were still a bit softer than anticipated with ongoing supply-chain “headwinds,” company executives reported this morning while releasing the 2024 year-end results.

Bombardier delivered 73 Globals and 73 Challenger 3500s and 650s last year. This marks two fewer Globals from 2023 but a 10-aircraft jump in Challengers.

Shipments missed guidance for 2024 of 150 to 155 deliveries but were near the 150 range that Bombardier anticipated for its product lines in upcoming years. In the fourth quarter, Global deliveries dipped by three, to 29, while Challenger shipments increased by four, to 28.

Bombardier’s services business topped $2 billion in the year, representing a doubling of revenues in the past five years and a mark reached a year earlier than anticipated.

“We have…reached our ambitions of $2 billion in service revenue a full year ahead of schedule,” Bombardier president and CEO Éric Martel told analysts. “To put that in perspective, we doubled a high-margin billion-dollar business in less than five years, and we did it organically. We did it through careful network extension and by offering services and support to our customers through the value. It’s not just impressive in the aerospace industry; it’s a big accomplishment, period.”

As a result, Bombardier revenues still beat guidance at $8.7 billion, which represented an 8% growth over the $8.05 billion in 2023. Net income in 2024 slipped to $370 million, compared with $445 million a year earlier. But adjusted EBITDA increased by 11% to $1.36 billion, also slightly besting guidance. The results reflected the increased deliveries and services revenue but were partially offset by supply chain disruption costs, Bombardier reported.

“Supply chain will remain a very sharp focus as it continues to introduce pressure across our operations. It certainly was true in the fourth quarter last year,” Martel said. “Our teams have done a lot to mitigate risk and be successful in both upstream. That said, supply chain will still be a facing factor for our delivery profile as we manage inventory build.”

Demand remained consistent, providing a book-to-bill of 1:1, while backlog grew from $14.2 billion at the end of 2023 to $14.4 billion at the end of last year.

Meanwhile, Bombardier continues to strengthen its financial underpinnings, bringing down its adjusted net debt to adjusted EBITDA ratio from 3.3 times in 2023 to 2.9 times last year and having some $2.1 billion of available liquidity at the end of 2024.

The airframer continues to progress on the Global 8000, the follow-on that will supplant its flagship ultra-long-range Global 7500. Noting that the Global 8000 continues to sell well, Bombardier remains on track with service entry by year-end after receiving all the necessary approvals. However, Martel expects some Global 7500s to still be delivered in early 2026.

Further, Bombardier is finalizing the upgrade package for in-service Global 7500s so they can match the Global 8000’s top speed of Mach 0.94 and cabin pressure altitude of 2,900 feet at 41,000 feet.

While sales activity is strong, Bombardier executive v-p and CFO Bart Demosky said Bombardier brought in fewer deposits in 2024 as part of a “risk management strategy that we deployed throughout the year where we took a conservative approach to selling our Global 8000s to keep a buffer on availability just in case we encountered any of the similar challenges some of our peers have had as they’ve been bringing aircraft or derivatives into service.”