In this special edition from the Paris Airshow, we look at the future of the aviation market.

This week, Counting the Cost is at the Paris Airshow, a bi-annual event where aerospace companies from across the globe show off their latest jets and cutting-edge technology.

Industry heavyweights Airbus and Boeing chose different tacks on the future of aviation with both companies presenting a variety of carriers at the event at Le Bourget.

European manufacturer Airbus continued to push big jets but it was a huge surprise that after the first day the A380 airliner, a behemoth of the sky and always a huge draw at the show, failed to sell.

Questions over fuel efficiency and whether its engines are good enough have cast doubt over the A380 programme.

Boeing's 787 Dreamliner appears to have tackled the issue of fuel efficiency and the smaller aircraft was taking several orders at the event.

"This year we expect to deliver somewhere between 750 and 755 aircraft," Randy Tinseth, the vice-president of Marketing at Boeing Commercial Airplanes told Counting the Cost.

"It should be a record for us and clearly it will outpace our competition."

Meanwhile, Airbus said it was forecasting a whopping 32,600 new planes from now until the year 2034.

"Out of the 32,600 around 22,900 are single-aisle airplanes, that's 70 percent of the total, but the wide-body total is worth 55 percent of the $4.9tn that the market is worth," Alan Pardoe, the head of Marketing at Airbus told Counting the Cost.

Ariane and SpaceX go head-to-head

There was also another transatlantic rivalry brewing but much further up in orbit.

Commercial space flight is being increasingly competitive and there are two major players going at it with the European Space Agency's Ariane programme battling against the US' SpaceX programme.

Gaele Winters, the head of launches at the European Space Agency joins the programme.

France's Rafale fighters

Drones, missiles, and fighter jets were also on sale at the Paris Airshow but their announcement was low-key when compared to the business dealings of both Airbus and Boeing.

France's Rafale fighter jet has seen its profile rise as of late and with combat operations in Libya, Afghanistan and Mali; orders have been flooding in, particularly from the Middle East.

Eric Trappier, the CEO of Dassault aviation that produces the jets told Counting the Cost that the Rafale was the "perfect aircraft."

Source: Al Jazeera