Louis Gallois points at recovery signs at Airbus

Louis Gallois points at recovery signs at Airbus, but also at further cost-saving measures. During his meeting with the French Ajef journalist association yesterday, Louis Gallois responded to concerns expressed earlier by political representatives of the Midi- Pyrenees region. He stressed the “record orders” booked by Airbus and “all the EADS divisions”, as well as the “better-than-expected” first-quarter results. He reiterated the fullyear target of “at least 700 new orders for 470 deliveries”. Mr Gallois also asserted that Airbus would be able to finance the launch the A350 manufacturing next year, hence there is “no urgency” in finding investors for the subsidiaries it is creating to group together certain Airbus sites in Germany and in France. “This is one of the reasons why we froze the sale of the French and German sites, which accounted for only 7% of the 53% share of A350 work we intend to outsource”. Mr Gallois pointed out the priority was “maintaining the development rhythm” of the new aircraft, for which the major work packages have already been awarded to suppliers. The rest should be awarded “by the end of the year”. So there is no change to the A350 XWB schedule, asserted Mr Gallois. Nonetheless, he confirmed that additional cost-saving measures would be unveiled “before the summer”, reiterating that the company could not remain “inactive” in the face of the ever-weakening dollar. He declined to specify the content of the additional measures. Yet, Mr Gallois said outsourcing was unavoidable, though “we want to keep the heart of our activity in Europe, notably our advanced technology operations”. AFP (20/05), Reuters (20/05), AFX (20/05), Les Echos, La Tribune, Liberation, La Croix, France Soir, Hamburger Abendblatt, Borsen-Zeitung, International Herald Tribune, The Wall Street Journal Europe