Airbus Gloomier About Airbus Than We Are
Boy, when we said recently that Airbus was behind the times, we didn’t expect them to raise the ante on us.
It could be 15 years before Airbus overtakes Boeing in terms of product development, the company’s chief executive Christian Streiff said in an interview published in The Financial Times on Thursday.
Jeez, and we thought 2011 would be long enough for a wake-up call. Meanwhile, Northwest adds fuel to our argument in favor of regional jets.
Northwest Airlines Corp. asked a bankruptcy judge for permission to buy 72 new commercial airplanes for serving small and midsize markets.
The order will be split between 36 Embraer 175 aircraft and 36 Bombardier CRJ900 aircraft. Northwest said it had options for another 96 Bombardiers and an additional 136 Embraers.
Why? We’ll tell you (again:)
- The
onlymost successful US airline, Southwest (LUV) earned its success by offering non-stop flights from smaller airports. Rejional jets could open point-to-point non-stop service to an even larger number of even smaller airports - paving the way for the next Southwest. - Smaller jets can be loaded and unloaded quickly, saving precious time for passengers and precious money for the operator - who can keep the jets flying (earning money) rather than sitting on the ground (costing money).
- Smaller airports allow passengers to pass more quickly through security, further saving time. Plus, greater point-to-point service to more markets means they also save time by not having to connect through hubs.
- Lacking the dramatic potential of larger jets, regional jets are likely to be avoided by terrorists.
So now that we think about it, maybe we should revise our odds and go for Embraer to win, Bombardier to place and Boeing to show. But as Airbus’ Streiff said:
This is such a long-term business. We must catch up. In 15 years I hope we are ahead of Boeing again.
Which is a good point. Given 15 years they could probably design a regional jet of their own.
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