"no choice but to shut down the program"
Poor choice of words which gives Emirates the opportunity to squeeze the hell out of Airbus.
Airbus has reported its most prolific year to date in terms of deliveries, but also warned that it needs a new buyer of its flagship A380 if it is to continue production. Speaking at its annual “Orders and Deliveries” event yesterday, the plane-maker said it delivered 718 passenger craft last year, four more than its previous …
Or allowing Airbus to play the "No, that's our final offer. Accept it or we walk away from any further production" move.
The question of course is wheather or not Emirates believe they really would do that.
I kind of think they might.
Emirates can always play the "give us what we want or we shift everything to Boeing" card. The fact that Emirates Airline is the only one interested in the A380, proves that Airbus doesn't know how to sell its flagship product.
No, they can’t. Firstly Boeing have discontinued the 747 and now don’t make anything remotely close to the capacity of the A380. Secondly retraining their pilots and maintenance staff to whatever they replace them with would be hugely expensive.
Adding to that, Emirates is not the only customer, it’s just the largest.
The 747-8 in passenger configuration is down to 5 examples in the pipeline, and the only real options on the table are the VIP versions (i.e. Air Force One's two examples plus some... ahem... Middle Eastern customers). The freight version on the other hand *is* still available and there's a good backlog.
There is basically no demand for passenger 747's. Boeing will be happy to build you a batch if you order more than 5 or so at at time, or pay through the nose for a custom "private jet" version, but almost all of what is in the order book is freighter versions.
I think Airbus just gambled and lost. There is little to no demand for A380 sized airliners and demand will never pick up. A350/Boeing 777 class twins are large enough and much more economic to operate for most airlines who struggle to even fill those.
"There is little to no demand for A380 sized airliners and demand will never pick up."
There are specific niches for them, especially as most major airlines have retired 747s over the last 5 years. bear in mind that the market for large transports is so low that only ~1600 747s have ever been built (compare with a combined backlog of more than 12,000 aircraft on the 737+A320 lines)
Fuel prices have been amazingly low for the last decade and are showing signs of coming back up. I was expecting oil to snap through $200/barrel when the price wars finally stopped - that hasn't happened but it's likely to, at which point economy minded fliers will gravitate to the hub+spoke model and forgo the time savings.
"Fuel prices have been amazingly low for the last decade and are showing signs of coming back up. I was expecting oil to snap through $200/barrel when the price wars finally stopped"
That's because the price wars haven't really stopped, only paused as suppliers are keeping themselves in check. And don't forget the work into synthetic fuel production (being conducted by the US Navy, who always have a fuel issue).
"don't forget the work into synthetic fuel production"
I'm not. It's unlikely to end up costing less than $300/barrel simply because if it's not done with algae then it's competing with food production (eg, jatophra) and there's not enough space in the agricultural market for that to be more than niche production.
In the long term we're going to need a nuclear economy - preferably molten salt for safety (20 years to commercialise) until fusion is ready (I think 100-150 years to commercialise, realistically) - and if you have molten salt nuclear tech then you have the heat to run a haber process to crack water to H2 and enough energy to tack on carbon atoms for easy handling whilst you're at it (ie, carbon neutral kerosene).
Carbon emissions are already well past the 2C tipping point and we're on track for 4C - the real danger isn't sea level rises though. People can move. Ocean acidification blowing the food chains apart and/or an anoxic event dropping global atmospheric oxygen levels down to 12-15% is the real thing to worry about. Our hungry brains can't handle low oxygen levels and our cardiopulmonary system tends to clog up if exposed to prolonged low oxygen levels, as the primary human body response is to increase haemoglobin levels by thickening the blood - which makes it much harder to pump around.
When you look at it that way, the chinese government's crash program of investigating every alternative to carbon and building a shedload of PWR/CANDU nukes in the meantime makes sense - whatever they find that works will need to be made available to developing countries at low cost as they can more than make up the any reductions the developed countries may make. Human nature means that when the shit hits the fan it will already be too late to make reductions vs going cold turkey. If/when LFTRs are ready they can eat the PWR waste.
It'd be even better and things would proceed faster if everyone put aside their differences and concentrated on getting LFTR/MSRs out the door asap. Whilst they have some downsides they're not as big a set of downsides as PWR nuclear power and we can't afford to sit around procrastinating.
Airbus made a BIG mistake
Boeing looked at the market when Airbus was designing the A-380 and said ...NAH
We don't think that the market is going this way . We'll stick with the 747 that people will buy it up as the price drops. People want Non stop twin aisles not great fat ugly buses.
I had the misfortune to fly an Air France A380 from Paris to Miami . Friggin horror show even with the "premium" coach . A glorified cattle car guaranteed to cripple you within 4 hrs of the 10hr flight . The ingress and egress was akin to the aforementioned cattle car not to mention the three carousels of luggage to deal with the 500 hapless souls and their 2 bags per
Boeing looked at the market when Airbus was designing the A-380 and said ...NAH
My understanding is that it wasn't because the concept was flawed; it was that the market wasn't big enough for a second option.
" it was that the market wasn't big enough for a second option."
Which is exactly the reason that the L1011 and DC10/11 failed and took the manufacturers with them.
The difference is that the A380 is a halo craft of a range being sold and the farm isn't being bet on it. Airbus can afford to keep it as a low volume item as its presence sells the smaller birds.
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Emirates has already asked Airbus to look at re-engining the A380 (i.e. new engines, better fuel economy and fuel efficiency), but Airbus ruled it out for the current moment because it's not too bad yet. It has been clear that a 'A380neo' is *not* off the table (i.e. if EngineAlliance and Rolls Royce are improving their engines significantly, they'll be interested in doing it.
Airbus has also gotten into the refurbishment business, and the first Singapore A380s have gone in for a refresher.
The A380 is not dead *yet*, but like the B747, it's on life support... ;-)
" the first Singapore A380s have gone in for a refresher."
Bear in mind that the first few A380s off the assembly line were overweight due to the wiring hassles. They're more likely to end up as freighters than to return to revenue passenger service (which should result in them being a bit lighter)
If you look at airbus.com you find this about the A380.
Total orders 317, total deliveries 222. aircraft in operation 222. Apparently not quite dead yet, but a niche market looking at the numbers no doubt..
Also:
"As of 31 December, Airbus’ overall backlog of jetliners remaining to be delivered stood at 7,265 aircraft – a new industry record."
What they need is an A380 NEO.
The New Engine Option led to savings in fuel consumption that made the extra outlay for the A380 uneconomical.
Getting ultra high bypass engines (maybe with geared fans) onto the A380 as well as the other aerodynamic refinements that made the NEO such a hit would make the A380 competitive again. The question is: Will it be sufficiently competitive to pay back the investment?
I am convinced that they are crunching numbers in Toulouse and Hamburg.
What they need is an A380 NEO.
Lost in the report is the culprit: 78 A350 WXBs
This is what is eating the 380's lunch. Unless 380 is improved, the 350 will devour its bigger sibling (especially once the "ridiculously long range" 350 option BA and friends are negotiating for starts shipping).
"This is what is eating the 380's lunch. Unless 380 is improved, the 350 will devour its bigger sibling (especially once the "ridiculously long range" 350 option BA and friends are negotiating for starts shipping)."
Correct me if I'm wrong, but perhaps one of the biggest issues dogging the 380 is that you need special accommodations for it, not just in the runways but at the terminals, whereas B777's and A350's were built to fit within the B747 profile and therefore can fly in placed already built to accommodate 747's and so on without much additional outlay?
Nissan rebadged the Datsuns for the same reason that Mitsubishi rebadged themselves from Colt in some markets - worldwide consistency in marketing.
In both cases the "brands" that were being used were originally car model names that non-japanese distributors decided to use as brands for various reasons.
Personally I preferred the Datsun Insult.
"Nissan rebadged the Datsuns for the same reason that Mitsubishi rebadged themselves from Colt in some markets - worldwide consistency in marketing.".
It was Datsun in Finland too, the first European country to import them (1962) also the first Toyotas came to Finland. I had a 1967 Toyota I bought as second hand, The joke then was "when will you get a real Yota".
For the name change, why not use the Wiki. (trying and trying to teach you commentards).
"Datsun is an automobile brand owned by Nissan. Datsun's original production run began in 1931. From 1958 to 1986, only vehicles exported by Nissan were identified as Datsun. By 1986 Nissan had phased out the Datsun name, but re-launched it in June 2013 as the brand for low-cost vehicles manufactured for emerging markets..........".
Japanese cars came as a shock for car makers around the world, cheep, reliable no fuss cars. It took some time for European producers to recover. The Brits never did although I suppose there was other deep reasons too.
"Datsun's original production run began in 1931. "
The marketing story back in the 70s and 80s was that the original Nissan car was called the DAT (initials of the founders) and the next model was the "Son of DAT", aka Datson and they chose Datsun as looking stylistically better as well as alluding to the land of the rising sun. (which is also where the Sunny name is supposedly derived from)
https://www.nissan-global.com/EN/HERITAGE/short_story/en_p05-01.html
'Correct me if I'm wrong, but perhaps one of the biggest issues dogging the 380 is that you need special accommodations for it, not just in the runways but at the terminals, whereas B777's and A350's were built to fit within the B747 profile and therefore can fly in placed already built to accommodate 747's and so on without much additional outlay?'
Although oddly the latest B777 is going to have folding wingtips to fit in the existing footprint. I think with the A380 the main issue is the jetways to get passengers on and off. It's footprint isn't much more than a B747 but if you want to get people on and off before they die of old age you need upper and lower jetways which nothing else needs.
The person who needs their coat is the author. I know the Reg can't afford proof readers, or sub-editors, but that puts the onus on the hack to try and make it intelligible. I had to infer that some bloke called "Leahy" is probably AIrbus's COO because it isn't clear.
So if Canada were to close a bunch of northern airstrips it only keeps open as emergency diverts - then only the A350 would be able to make a lot of Eu-USA flights and Boeings would have to do a long expensive southern route.
Boeing has just screwed Canada over with a 50% duty on Bombardier and Airbus has just take Bombardier under its wing...
I agree. I love them. I'm lucky enough to have only flown in business and first on them (not because that's where I usually sit, comrades) on Qatar and Malaysia. They are lovely and quiet, especially upstairs. The Qatar ones are spotless, with a separate bar if you're in the posh cabins. Malaysia's are in poor condition as they can't make the sums work. KL isn't a big destination and there is a lot of competition for those wanting to change planes in that part of the world. They only fly the A380 to Heathrow and often struggle to fill them - the price I got first class for when I used it last year was not a huge amount more than economy on some airlines. Even this isn't going to last long, as they're replacing them with the A350 on this route and are reconfiguring some of their A380s to all-economy with tightly-packed seats, to be used for the Hajj and not much else.
The big downside with them, and a lot of the newer planes is the fact that they are so quiet. Without the droning of the engines like you get on the 747 for example, you hear everything so it's harder to sleep.
They do make sense for a lot of routes, particularly those where you are going to have to change planes in the middle of nowhere, like the Middle East. But for most airlines if it's the choice of two A350s or two B787s per day on a route or one A380 they will prefer the former as it provides more choice and the potential for shorter connections. Airlines don't want people sitting around airports either.
"Malaysia's are in poor condition as they can't make the sums work"
That has little to do with the aircraft and a lot to do with the airiline. MAS was struggling and in deep shit for long enough that MH370 (and a bunch of earlier critical safety incidents) happened _because_ of it, not the other way around.