…As Airbus bids adieu to superjumbo A380

While Airbus pulls plug on costly A380 Superjumbo and deliveries to stop in 2021, WOLE SHADARE writes on aircraft that proved to be the game changer in the bitter aerospace rivalry between Boeing and Airbus

There is no doubt that the rivalry between the two biggest aircraft manufacturers, Airbus and Boeing dates back to many years. Both firms located in Toulouse, France and Seattle, Washington has been at each other’s throat trying to outdo one another in the global market of medium size and wide-body airplanes.

Over the past 20 years, Airbus and Boeing have dominated the commercial aviation industry. Each own roughly 50 per cent of the global commercial airliner market. Airbus is relatively new when compared to Boeing. While Boeing has been around since 1916, the Airbus consortium did not come together until 1970.

Airbus’s decision to terminate its A380 superjumbo jet program as of early 2021 may amount to good news for the company’s future. For rival Boeing, while there is silver lining for its large 777X jet some years out, near-term it could face loss of a big order.
To passengers, the A380 feels immediately different— spacious, smooth and oddly elegant for a jet so gargantuan. Yet to Airbus, it’s become a burden so super-sized that the European manufacturer is ending its production for good.

The Airbus A380 superjumbo jet is the largest airliner ever built, the pride of Europe, a majestic double-decker that thrills onlookers as it flies past and offers passengers unprecedented space and comfort. Now it’s also the biggest jet-program failure in Airbus history.
Development talks for the plane began in 2000, meant to be Airbus’ 21st-century answer to rival Boeing’s 1960s-era 747, and one of the most ambitious endeavours in aviation. Its Rolls Royce engines were quieter than ever, far out on the extra-long wings. Carbon-fiber technology was used for the body to make it lighter and easier to manoeuvre. Its double-decker construction allowed room for bars, duty-free shops and even showers.
Less than 14 years after its maiden flight, barely a decade after it started carrying passengers, the A380 is being mothballed.

Just 17 more of the planes will be completed, wrapping up in 2021. Emirates, its last and most loyal customer, said Thursday it’s switching to smaller planes instead.

Thursday’s decision to end the program came after Gulf carrier Emirates canceled orders for 39 of the giant airplanes, leaving a backlog too small to sustain production beyond early 2021. Strangely though, it may amount to good news for Airbus’ future.
And for rival Boeing, while there is a silver lining some years out, near-term there could be negative impacts. The blow to Airbus has complex implications for both manufacturers.

It comes with an accounting write-off of 463 million euros, or $523 million, marking at least an endpoint to years of losses for Airbus. However, the financial damage is limited because billions of dollars in European government launch aid will now be forgiven.The sting of the A380 blow will also be soothed by compensatory orders from Emirates for Airbus’ smaller A350 and A330neo wide-body jets.
Those new orders could have a secondary effect that damages Boeing; with those Airbus jets replacing an Emirates commitment for 40 similarly sized 787-10 Dreamliners that was never finalised.

Contrasting histories

The A380 failure is Airbus’ second jet-program disaster after the smaller wide-body A340 program ended prematurely in 2012. In contrast, Boeing, despite enormous troubles with many of its airplane programs, in each case has struggled through to commercial success.
Airbus delivered just 377 of the four-engine A340s before it terminated that program. And after it delivers the final 14 A380s to Emirates by early 2021, the superjumbo program will end with just 251 deliveries.

In contrast, not counting the failed 717 inherited from McDonnell Douglas, none of Boeing’s first seven legacy jet programs, from the 707 to the 777, has sold less than 1,000 planes. (For the small, single-aisle 737s, make that 10,500 and counting.)
And Boeing’s eighth legacy jet program, the 787 Dreamliner, has already delivered almost 800 jets, with firm orders that will take it past 1,400 deliveries.

The starkest A380 comparison is with the venerable Boeing 747 jumbo jet, which just turned 50 years old and has survived through multiple improved iterations to the latest 747-8 model. At the end of January, Boeing had delivered 1,548 of these Queen of the Skies aircraft.
The 747 first flew in 1969 and the A380 in 2005. Astonishingly, Boeing should still be building the 747 when the A380 is gone.

Some 3,000 to 3,500 Airbus employees across Europe work on the A380. On Thursday, management offered the hope that job losses will be limited by increases in production on other programs, including the A320, the A330neo and the A350.

The agreement with Emirates replaces the 39 A380s it canceled with new orders for 40 A330-900neo and 30 A350-900 aircraft. The order for the slow-selling A330neo will be particularly welcome.

Subsidies and risk

The A380 failure also points to a large imbalance in the risk borne by the two airplane giants when they launch new jet programs.
The financial blow to Airbus of the A380 failure, while severe, is cushioned by not having to fully repay the government loans it used to help develop the A380. In contrast, a commercial failure of similar magnitude could potentially bring Boeing down. One of the jetliner’s first test pilots took a more philosophical view. While he’s “feeling a bit sad” about the news, Claude Lelaie says the giant plane will be remembered for pushing the barriers of aviation, like the supersonic Concorde.

Mixed reactions

Then French President Jacques Chirac hailed the plane as “a symbol of what Europeans can do together.” Airbus’ then chief salesman, John Leahy, called it “game-changing” for the industry.
Yet to detractors, the A380 smacked of hubris, a vanity project by managers who saw bigger as better despite an uncertain market for a plane so huge that airports had to modify their runways and gates. It faced repeated production setbacks and cost overruns. Order cancellations led to a restructuring at Airbus that saw thousands of job cuts.

One emblematic problem: a standoff between German and French engineers over which software to use to design the cockpit. The company lost a quarter of its market value in a single day in 2006 when the resulting delays became public.

Last line

Airlines in fact seemed more interested in mid-size planes for regional routes, notably in Asia, where travel within the region has boomed in recent years. Even on longer routes, airlines seemed to prefer smaller planes that were easier to fill. The 380 may have just been too large of a step for the market to handle.

Wole Shadare