Bombardier Is Having Big Troubles With Its New C Series Plane

Bombardier announced this week that its delayed C Series airliner will resume test flights after a summer-long layoff.

The Canadian-built Boeing and Airbus challenger had been grounded since a May 29th incident that saw one of the jet's Pratt & Whitney engines suffer a massive failure during a test.

Since then, Goldman Sachs cut its target price for Bombardier and advised investors to sell the company's stock. Even worse, the C Series' launch partner, Braathens Aviation, announced its intention to remove itself from that role. The Swedish charter airline cited the C Series' continuing delays as the main reason for its decision.

The C Series' competitors are the Boeing 737-700 and Airbus A319. Both are veteran aircraft with more than 1,000 orders on the books and more than 1,000 aircraft already delivered. The C Series has so far racked up only 203 orders - and no aircraft delivered.

Goldman Sachs analysts Noah Poponak believes it will be very difficult for Bombardier to hit its projected service debut, currently set for the end of 2015. According to Reuters, the C Series has completed less than 15% of a planned 244o testing hours.

In spite of Bombardier's efforts to recover lost ground, can the C Series survive in the brutally competitive, but also highly profitable, short-to-medium-range airliner market?

Here's how it stacks up against the competition: