Airbus ‘Bleeding Cash Fast’, Faces Deeper Job Cuts, Planes demand evaporates

• Far reaching survival measures underway-CEO

Airbus CEO, Guillaume Faury has warned his 135,000 employees to brace for potentially deep job cuts as the manufacturer is “bleeding cash at an unprecedented speed” amid the aviation crisis brought on by Covid-19.

A letter sent to employees and seen by news outlets warned that Airbus’ survival is at stake unless it takes “far-reaching measures”.

The internal memo was sent just days before Airbus releases its financial results for the first quarter of 2020, which are expected to be overshadowed by the impact of the pandemic.

Already this month, Airbus announced that it is cutting production by a third as the demand for new aircraft has evaporated and customers continue to defer and cancel orders.

Deliveries of new planes have effectively halted since mid-March.

While Airbus is furloughing around 3,000 staff in France, Faury said: “but we may now need to plan for more far-reaching measures.”

“The survival of Airbus is in question if we don’t act now,” he wrote in the letter first seen by Reuters news agency.

It is unlikely that European governments would let the industrial giant of Airbus collapse and the company has already secured billions of euros in additional credit.

That could see the company emerge from the pandemic significantly restructured and resized.

Wole Shadare