Zut Alors!

I have to admit, it’s been kind of painful over the past two years to watch hometown hero Boeing get its bell rung by Euro-conglomerate Airbus. While the folks in Toulouse reveled in the imminent success of their two-deck A380 superjumbo, eclipsed Boeing in annual sales for the first time in history, and relentlessly slagged their competitor’s own biggie (the older but vastly more elegant 747), the Americans played it cool—and played their cards. They cut production of aircraft that weren’t selling, announced a new version of the 747, and unveiled the superefficient 787 Dreamliner.

Then they quietly began taking more and more orders for the Dreamliner. For the first six months of this year, Boeing has sold 496 airplanes in total, compared to Airbus's paltry 117. Now comes word—the latest in what is proving to be a terrible year for Airbus—that the A380 is delayed a full two years due to production problems at the European giant, which has also suffered multiple financial scandals this year.

The delay is huge news. It’s not like it’s merely a disappointment for the airlines that they won’t get their shiny new birds as soon as they thought. The airlines who have ordered them—Emirates, Qantas and Virgin among them—must put into motion many enormously complicated and hugely expensive systems to accommodate the beasts, including lobbying airports around the world to upgrade their facilities to handle the A380’s massive size and passenger complement, which will always be well north of 550. This is a politically volatile industry, and the airlines are furious. Many are canceling orders. Meanwhile, Boeing will happily be coughing up as many of its on-schedule Dreamliners and tried-and-true 747s as the industry wants to buy. Perhaps the tables have turned, non? —Eric Adams

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Comments

[Elgar Elbert]

Airlines furious? Yes, but cancelations? Not one.

Those airlines which have invested in Airbus have a different vision of the future, it seems from the majority of airlines. Or perhaps, different needs would be a better way to put it. But there is no reason for them to cancel at this point.

What is being left unsaid is that Airbus is stalled at about 150 planes in sales of their super jumbo. I don't know how many they need to break even, but I've heard somewhere around 300 to 400 planes.

Airbus has been subsidized by European taxpayers, and its' success to date has been the result of the deep pockets of European governments. Where they will go without these subsidies is worth asking. Boeing receives none.

The next big story about the Airbus jumbo, I think, will be ,"Who pays for it". Like the Concorde , which never was a commercial success, it seems that every delay makes reaching the break even point more and more difficult for Airbus.

[Paul Muller]

This post is not about Airbus succeeding or not. It's about how Americans who like to think of themselves as competitive are just sore losers and take it personally. You admit it yourself "It's been painful", so you are left making all sorts excuses such as "our old 747 looks better" or "it's paid for by euro taxes" and crying victory when development of new Airbus planes is delayed. Do you also read the news hoping that Toyota and Honda are going to announce a massive recall?
If you weren't so stupid and as competitive as you like to think you would in fact welcome foreign competition from Airbus and the likes, which push US companies to make reliable cars and efficient planes. Ultimately thats means more power to the dumb consuming masses (you). But no we don't want that, we don't want no stinkin' eurofrench planes. By the way did you know that darling Boeing uses a French software platform to design their planes? Oh non alors! Donnez moi le croissant tres magnifique!!!!