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This topic comprises 9 pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
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Author
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Topic: A380 - world's largest pasenger aircraft - makes maiden flight
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Leo Enticknap
Film God
Posts: 7474
From: Loma Linda, CA
Registered: Jul 2000
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posted 10-15-2006 03:47 AM
The last British corporate entity to have any interest in Airbus (BAe Systems) sold its 20% share to the European Aviation and Defence Consortium (the French and German governments, to all intents and purposes) about a month ago, just before the true extent of the A380 problems and the production inefficiencies with the existing model range became apparent and the share price got hosed.
The British government has not wanted to be in the airliner business since its fingers got burnt with the Concorde white elephant. The French and the German governments now have themselves an airliner business which, however serious the short term problems it now faces, has an established reputation for delivering competitive and reliable products in the form of the A319/20/21 and A330/340 series. I can't see any incentive for Boeing to want to buy it (even if they closed down production immediately, they'd still have to support existing fleets or risk falling foul of European competition law), or the French and the Germans walking away from Airbus and (if they wanted to stay in the airliner business) having to start over.
Boeing has received large subsidies from the US taxpayer, mainly in the form of military R & D contracts, just as Airbus has been fed bazillions of taxpayers' euros in the form of regional development grants, tax breaks, unofficially underwritten sales to state 'flag carrier' airlines, etc. etc. The bottom line is that the cost of designing a new airliner and getting it to market is now just too big for private enterprise to do it on its own, given the regulatory environment that both American and European business operates within.
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Paul Mayer
Oh get out of it Melvin, before it pulls you under!
Posts: 3836
From: Albuquerque, NM
Registered: Feb 2000
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posted 10-16-2006 09:18 PM
For Bill Enos, it's really hard to say - each airline is different. But as a crude ballpark figure I'd guess/say that a break-even load factor (percentage of seats sold over seats available) is around 60%. But every airline has different costs of doing business so break-even load factor will be quite different for every airline.
This is where the Legacy Six carriers (UAL, DAL, CAL, NWA, AAL, USA) are having a hard time, since their costs of doing business are generally higher than that of the so-called LCCs (Low Cost Carriers like SWA and Jet Blue and my present employer Allegiant Air).
Industry average load factor is around 85%. After looking at all costs the typical return-on-investment at even the best running air carriers is around 4-5%. Not bad, but maybe not the best place to put money for some investors. You really have to love this business to be in this business.
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This topic comprises 9 pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
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