Airbus reorganizes to reduce production costs

Airbus’ plan is called “Lead”. It was unveiled at the end of September. Some will see it as a play on words to move from lead (translation of the English word), a heavy metal, to lighter weight and remain market leader. The objective is to resort less to missions entrusted to external firms, to encourage internal mobility… It is a question of tackling bureaucracy and all the burdens which result from it, like States which seek to make public savings in their mode of operation. The objective is to concentrate on what the group calls the fundamentals, that is to say, in particular, production rates.

Airbus management says it listens to its employees who point out what they consider to be daily obstacles: the multiplication of hierarchical layers, manufacturing processes that have become too complicated, numerous advisors who overdo the tasks… the goal is really to focus on ramping up the company’s main activities to facilitate the production, development and sale of aircraft which have been undermined since the end of the Covid crisis.

Airbus denies disguising a possible social plan. On the other hand, the European aircraft manufacturer does not hide the need to reorganize urgently. Employees and their representatives remain very attentive to the group’s projects. Faced with the difficulties of its supplier chain in keeping up with its pace of ramp-up, Airbus had to lower its delivery targets. Nothing good in the context of strong international competition.

For 2024, Airbus was counting on the delivery of 800 aircraft, practically the same rate as in 2019, the reference year, just before the pandemic torpedoed the aeronautics sector. The forecast today is 770 deliveries. Around thirty fewer devices weighing on overall turnover. Hence a necessary reorganization of the production tool, without cutting into the workforce that the group will need once all the brakes are released.