Louis Gallois yesterday told a meeting of the Anglo-American Press Association in Paris

that EADS is suffering from the weakness of the dollar to the euro, describing this situation as a “sword of Damocles” over the company. He affirmed that, should the US currency remain so low, its subsidiary Airbus should change its development model. In the past six months alone, the dollar has lost 11 % of its value against the euro. “It is all about desensitising Airbus to the dollar”, said Mr Gallois. In this context, he explained, EADS is forced to look for ways to increase its natural hedging, either through acquisitions in the US and in the dollar area, by encouraging suppliers to set up dollar-based production, or by transferring some of EADS’s activities outside the euro zone. He added he intended to transform EADS North America into an “American citizen”. Mr Gallois also highlighted that the successor to the Power 8 restructuring programme, due to end in 2011, would be based on a 1.45 euro-dollar exchange rate. Power 8 notably involves the sale of seven Airbus and EADS manufacturing sites in Europe. The CEO of EADS said talks over the group’s Laupheim facility were continuing and that the company was in the final stages of concluding planned deals with GKN in the UK and Latecoere in France. Regarding the German sites in Nordenheim, Varel and Augsburg, he confirmed that EADS was planning to set up an “autonomous company” to group them together after talks with OHB failed. He added that the group was in discussions with potential shareholders for the new entity. “The objective is for us not to hold the majority –to be a minor shareholder or to be absent”, he pointed out. Finally, Mr Gallois said an ongoing investigation by French financial regulator AMF into alleged insider trading at the company should not affect the recent US Air Force tanker contract win as the probe predates the award. He acknowledged, however, that the group’s image could be adversely affected as a relatively large number of managers are involved in the probe, but that he was determined to defend EADS’s image “with unfailing determination”. Reuters (15/04), AFX (15/04), Bloomberg (15/04), Dow Jones Newswires (15/04), Associated Press (15/04), France Soir, International Herald Tribune