Airbus has announced new delays for its massive A380 superjumbo jet. The French company reported today that it is having continued problems with wiring installations. The troubled program has already been plagued by two previous delays and this latest hitch could set back deliveries by another six months.
The $300 million USD Airbus A380, which is the biggest airliner ever built, has a three-class seating capacity of 555 people and can carry a maximum of 800 in all-economy class seating. Airbus has already received orders from Virgin Atlantic, Qantas, Lufthansa, Singapore Airlines, Korean Air, FedEx and UPS. Reuters reports:
The 12-billion-euro ($15 billion) programme to produce a new class of mammoth plane has already been hit twice by problems in fitting each jet’s 500 km (300 miles) of wiring, culminating in a 2 billion euro profit warning and management shake-up in June…Assembly workers in Toulouse, southern France, have been bogged down for a year in airlines’ request for special cabin features and frills that affect each plane’s wiring layout.
Shares of EADS, the parent company of Airbus, were down 3.9% on news of the announcement. Shares of EADS are down a total of 30% for the year as it recovers from setbacks caused by an A350 engine redesign and impending competition from Boeing’s stretched 747-8 and yet to be released 787 Dreamliner.
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