Malaysia Airlines said it will order 20 Airbus SE wide-body planes as the Southeast Asian carrier, seeking more fuel-efficient jets amid a travel rebound, focuses on cost.

The carrier will purchase the A330neo range of aircraft, with half the planes coming from lessor Avolon Holdings Ltd. and the rest ordered directly from Airbus through a sale and leaseback arrangement with Avolon, it said in a statement Monday. The A330neo — built on the same platform as an older model — will allow Malaysia Airlines to use the same crews as the current generation aircraft.

Malaysia Aviation Group, Malaysia Airlines’ parent company, expects to be operating at 70% of pre-pandemic levels for domestic and international flights by later this year, according to an April statement. The stronger-than-expected pick up in travel demand has also been a boon for planemakers, which are back to selling large numbers of jets after a more than two-year hiatus.

Malaysia Aviation is owned by sovereign wealth fund Khazanah Nasional Bhd. Bloomberg News reported in July that Airbus SE was leading a race against Boeing Co. for Malaysia Airlines’ wide-body jet replacement campaign.

Source: Civil Aviation Authority-Qatar