Dassault Aviation turned in a healthy performance in 2021, boosted by strong sales of its Falcon business jets and Rafale fighter.

In total, 30 Falcon jets were delivered – beating its guidance by five units, but down on 2020’s total of 34 aircraft. Dassault does not break down the split between models, however.

However, aided by the May launch of the new Falcon-10X flagship, order performance was significantly up on the previous year, at 51 aircraft versus 15 in 2020.

Backlog for the business jet family at 31 December stood at 55 units, a healthy increase on the year-end 2020 figure of 34.

For the Rafale, deliveries stood at 25 units – all to export customers – up from 13 in 2020.

Egypt signed for second batch of 30 Rafale fighters in 2021

Dassault also took in orders for 49 examples of the multirole fighter: 30 for Egypt, six for Greece, and 12 for France. A single example was also ordered by an undisclosed export customer.

However, the 2021 total does not include the 80 Rafales ordered by the United Arab Emirates in December, which will be added to the backlog this year. That figure now stands at 86 aircraft against 62 at the end of 2020, including examples for France, India and Qatar.