Seven Late Seven

Does anyone remember the degree of American gloating over the delays in the Airbus 380? It is quite funny in retrospect.

Here's CNN / Fortune, for instance, in March 2007:

The delays in what industry insiders have nicknamed the "Toulouse Goose" - a nod to Howard Hughes's ill-fated "Spruce Goose" - have also enabled Boeing to overtake Airbus in total plane orders for the first time since 2000.

Nobody could've predicted that in building its first completely new plane in decades, Boeing would face problems of its own. Boeing got no 'launch aid' so it would have a bigger incentive not to screw up, and it's a company within a single country with a more business-friendly climate, American commentators seem to have dreamt. At least the supposed awfulness of all the political influence on Airbus was on full display. See for instance this piece of analysis (not opinion) in the Chicago Tribune, in December 2006:

An examination of what has gone wrong with the A380 is a much broader issue than parts that don’t fit and computer systems that can’t communicate with one another. Indeed, corporate and European politics are as much to blame for Airbus problems as the breakdown between computer-design systems in France and Germany.

Some very basic thoughts: Major industrial projects like new airplanes are tough. A corporation that has not built a new airplane in decades has its own problems with a poorly geared corporate bureacracy. The airplane market is not a normal market. It does not have any kind of functioning competition, and political influence in it is inevitable and widespread. It is hardly an overstatement to say that planes are in general sold by European Ministers of Foreign Affairs and US Secretaries of State. Trying to get politics out of the market is a futile pursuit. We should rather focus on making sure that political governance on the market is consistent and serves the right goals.

And in that sense, we have to think about restraining Airbus' power8 programme. Airbus may well have a sound reason for closing some factories, but we should limit its design for vertical disintegration and global sourcing, which is a short-term and risky strategy that does not benefit us as Europeans. The launch aid funds are in the hands of our politicians. Just saying.