News
Airbus Attempts To Balance Production Cuts, Recovery Prospects
On the front page of its Marketplace section, the Wall Street Journal (4/6, B1, Michaels) reports, "As airlines defer deliveries and cancel orders," Airbus "faces a difficult balancing act: downshifting factories without killing prospects for a recovery." Now, the company's recently optimized factories "for fast production by adding equipment and staff must pull back without letting the fixed expense per plane rise painfully." Also, "Airbus's dozens of suppliers...can't get stuck with warehouses full of unsold parts or idle factories," otherwise "they will be too weak when demand returns. And laying off skilled workers could cause a brain drain that slows an eventual recovery." Meanwhile, "airlines and industry officials predict Airbus and Boeing will have to cut output more drastically to avoid producing planes that customers can't take."
