After filing a $336 million lawsuit against Boeing, ALAFCO had reached a mutual agreement with the U.S. based aircraft producer to end the legal dispute.
ALAFCO, an aircraft-leasing company based in Kuwait, said that the lawsuit against Boeing filed on April 22, 2020, was dropped after the two companies agreed to reduce the 737 MAX order by half.
The legal dispute started over Boeing’s refusal to cancel ALAFCO’s order, instigated by two 737 MAX incidents that ended in 346 deaths, which the Kuwait lessor deemed to be legally wrong. However, ALAFCO said the issue was resolved after the companies came to a mutual agreement.
Instead of the 40 aircraft that were supposed to reach ALAFCO after their order back on November 13, 2017, the Kuwait lessor will only receive 20 and would be refunded for the rest of the order.
As of now, 737 MAX aircraft are grounded worldwide after aviation authorities around the world prohibited the aircraft to operate commercial flights following the two fatal accidents in Indonesia and Ethiopia. Without counting the 20 737’s that are to be refunded to ALAFCO, Boeing put the cost of the groundings at $19 billion as of June 30, 2020.