What is Airbus doing about the new delays?
Airbus has announced the Power8 programme, the objective of which is to “reduce costs, save cash and develop new products faster”. A380 ORDERS SO FAR • Emirates: 43 aircraft • Lufthansa: 15 • Qantas: 20 • Air France: 10 • Singapore Airlines: 10 • Fedex: 10 • International Lease Finance: 10 • UPS: 10 • Thai Airways: 6 • Virgin Atlantic: 6 • Korean Air Lines: 5 • Etihad Airways: 4 • Qatar Airways: 2 • China Southern Airlines: 5 • Kingfisher Airlines: 5 • Malaysia Airlines: 6 Source: Airbus It wants to increase productivity by 20% and reduce overheads by 30%. This should deliver cash savings of 5bn euros by 2010, and reduce spending by 2bn euros per year after that. Job losses are inevitable, but bosses have not yet put a figure on it. Many analysts think that Airbus will have to try to reconfigure its elongated production line that features factories in France, Germany, Spain and the UK. There has been speculation that many of the 13,000 jobs in the UK, where the A380’s wings are built,
