Front L-R: Jordi Boto, CEO, EFW; Peter Goodman, CMO of CDB. Back L-R: Cronan Enright, CDB, Head of Strategy; Andres FABRE, MAS, Fleet Director & Board Member; Luis SIERRA, MAS CEO; Luis da Silva, CDB, Head of Americas; Paul Henshaw, CDB, VP Engineering)

Aircraft lessor CDB Aviation has taken delivery of its first freighter, an Airbus A330-300 passenger conversion (P2F).

The wholly owned Irish subsidiary of China Development Bank Financial Leasing Co said that the aircraft, converted by Elbe Flugzeugwerke (EFW), is the first of two A330 P2Fs to be leased to launch customer, Mexico-based cargo carrier, mas.

The carrier is expected to take delivery of the second aircraft in May.

“This is an important and historic day for CDB Aviation as we see the fruit of two years of intense work and collaboration, culminating in the delivery of our very first A330 P2F since we made the strategic entry into freighter aircraft leasing,” asserted Patrick Hannigan, CDB Aviation’s chief executive.

“We are grateful to the mas team for trusting CDB Aviation to be a partner in supporting their innovative fleet strategy and for being our very first A330P2F customer.”

Luis Sierra, mas’ Chief Executive Officer, remarked: “We feel honored that CDB Aviation trusted mas to be its first A330 P2F customer. For us, operating the -300 variant will open amazing opportunities in regional markets where there is a need for highly reliable aircraft, providing enough volume.

“Working together on this process was amazing, and we are already looking at ways to do more business with the CDB Aviation team.”

Commented Jordi Boto, EFW‘s chief executive: “We are glad about the in-time, in-quality re-delivery of the first A330P2F to our customer CDB Aviation. With this first of many more to come conversions we proved meeting customer expectations in these very challenging times.”