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Bloomberg
Airbus SE publicly questioned the future of the A380 for the first time, saying its flagship aircraft risks being shut down if the manufacturer fails to win a crucial order from the planemaker’s main backer, Emirates of Dubai.
Emirates is the only airline with enough capacity to take enough planes to keep the programme alive, Airbus sales chief John Leahy said in a presentation. Discussions are ongoing and Emirates can take six of the Airbus jets a year for the next eight to 10 years, he said.
Airbus has struggled to rack up sales of the superjumbo, which it argues will be needed to help increase passenger traffic at the world’s busiest airports. The company, based in Toulouse, France, was forced to slash production rates in July to try and stretch out the order book. Emirates, by far the biggest operator of the plane, scuttled a deal to buy 36 of the planes in November, leaving Airbus hanging and raising doubts about the future of the programme.
Airbus has done an analysis and can lower production to 6 planes a year, Chief Operating Officer
Fabrice Bregier said on the webcast. The company produced 15 in 2017 and has said it plans to reduce that figure to eight next year.