The new year brings new challenges to India's suffering airline industry with signs of worse things to come. Amid the increasing debt crisis, mounting jet fuel costs, soaring losses and an inability to raise fares in a cut-throat market, airlines in India face the daunting task of protecting their air operator permits and convincing regulators that they meet safety standards at the same time as they are cutting costs.

Engine MRO will outpace the total commercial aviation maintenance, repair and overhaul market growth this year, largely because engine events are more expensive and because more powerplants propelling the narrowbody fleet will need overhauls.

After booking record orders in 2011, ATR wants to increase revenues by 20% this year.

Sukhoi Civil Aircraft Co. only delivered one-third of the number of Superjet 100 aircraft it had planned for last year, yet the ones it did deliver to Armavia and Aeroflot are logging high daily utilization numbers. As it prepares to receive European type certification early this year, the company is increasing delivery volumes and expanding training facilities to ensure smooth operations for new customers.

Boeing certified the 747-8 passenger aircraft without use of a 3,300-gal. tail fuel tank, a restriction that is only likely to affect the nine VIP Boeing Business Jet orders among 106 the company has received for the four-engine jet. The lockout of the tank in the horizontal stabilizer cuts 300-400 nm off the airplane's maximum range. It was ordered because of an FAA certification requirement that Boeing demonstrate that the airplane will not be affected by the loss of a fitting in its wing-to-engine strut joint.

Despite continuing high fuel prices and a fragile economic recovery, analysts see an upside.

While 2011 was a tumultuous year for Australian airlines, enough challenges remain to make 2012 another pivotal period. Australian carriers certainly had a bumpy ride over the past 12 months—even by the volatile standards of the global airline industry. For some the upheaval was intentional, but for others the year was marked by unwelcome setbacks that are affecting their 2012 plans.

Boeing's progress toward producing two aircraft per day from its Renton, Wash., 737 factory has reached another milestone with the rollout of the first aircraft on a 35-per-month cycle. Renton's parallel final-assembly lines are scheduled to reach a combined rate of 42 aircraft/month in the first half of 2014. With 21-22 production days per month, that rate equals about one aircraft per day from each of the two lines. The last time Boeing increased its rates was in 2009.