The new Airbus A220-300 flies for the first time on July 10, 2018 at the Airbus delivery center, in Colomiers, southwestern France. (PASCAL PAVANI / AFP)

MONTREAL — Airbus SE plans to invest between 500 million euros and 1 billion euros (US$539 million-US$1.08 billion) this year on its A220 passenger jet program, Chief Executive Guillaume Faury said on Thursday at the company’s A220 factory in Mirabel, just outside Montreal.

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Earlier in February, Airbus raised its stake in the A220 program - known as Airbus Canada - to 75 percent from 50.1 percent after teaming up with the government of the Canadian province of Quebec to buy Bombardier’s 33.5 percent stake.

With the deal, Bombardier exited the civil aviation industry and bolstered the European planemaker’s position in its ongoing competition with US rival Boeing Co.

The A220, previously known as the CSeries, is a 110-130 seater aircraft, a little smaller than Airbus’s mainstay A320 jet.

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Airbus has been ramping up production of the A220 towards its maximum monthly capacity rate of 10 at its facility in Mirabel and to a monthly rate of four in Mobile, Alabama, targets it hopes to reach by the middle of this decade.

Production in the United States has become more important for Airbus since the US government slapped tariffs on jets made in Europe for purchase by US airlines following a years-long tariff dispute.