Ethiopian Airways today confirmed an order for the delivery of 12 Airbus A350XWBs announced earlier, with first deliveries starting in 2017.

With this new deal, the firm order book for the A350 increases to more than 500 orders, reaching 505 aircraft. Ethiopian Airways buys the -900 version of the aircraft, signing a deal worth approximately $3 billion.

It is the first Airbus order received from Ethiopian and marks "the start of a long-term relationship," CEO Girma Wake says. At the same time the airline has several Boeing 787s on order that will be used to serve routes within 7 to 8 hours from its main hub, while the A350 is used to serve longer-routes. Wake acknowledges that mixing fleets has some disadvantages, but says the fleets are large enough to complement the overal operational performance.