Boeing banks on cost effectiveness of C-40 to deliver foreign sales.

• Position: TRANSPORT AIRCRAFT

* Boeing has begun pitching its C-40 transport aircraft currently in use by the Navy and Air Force to international customers. Many countries around the world already own strategic airlift assets, but Boeing executives believe foreign militaries need a cheaper way of transporting troops and equipment.

The company is not trying to position the C-40 as a competitor to tactical and strategic airlift like Lockheed Martin's C-130, said Paul Oliver, Boeing's vice president of Middle East and Africa.

The C-40 cannot land on unimproved runways or have armored vehicles driven into its cargo bay the way purpose-built military transport aircraft can.

However, Boeing's plane can fly faster and traverse longer ranges than the C-130J at almost one-third of the latter aircraft's cost per flying hour, he said at the International Defense Exhibition and Conference held this February in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.

"I'm not saying we go in and replace every C-130 or every tactical [airlift] aircraft out there," he said. "What you're really trying to do is use your tactical airlift and your strategic airlift for what they're designed for: unimproved runways, roll on/roll off capability, going into harm's way and all that stuff"

The C-40 is based on Boeing's next-generation 737 commercial airliner, over 5,000 of which are...