Sunday, October 22, 2006
Airbus's New A380: Long Way Off From Breaking Even
When Airbus (the European airplane builder) launched its program to build a super-jumbo double-decker airplane called the A380 in December 2000, it said that it would need to sell about 250 of these morbidly obese sons-a-bitches in order to break even (at a list price of about $300 million, each).
Now, because of a laundry list of production problems resulting in significant delivery delays (more on that another day), this week Airbus said that it would need to sell 420 A380s to break even. And to date, Airbus only has orders for about 159.
Ouch.
Just to break even, Airbus needs to collect orders for 261 more planes, at a list price of more than $78 billion.
An early A380 painted in the Emirates livery. (Photo by Jonathan Bender)
Now, because of a laundry list of production problems resulting in significant delivery delays (more on that another day), this week Airbus said that it would need to sell 420 A380s to break even. And to date, Airbus only has orders for about 159.Ouch.
Just to break even, Airbus needs to collect orders for 261 more planes, at a list price of more than $78 billion.
An early A380 painted in the Emirates livery. (Photo by Jonathan Bender)
