[HN Gopher] How Airbus took off
___________________________________________________________________
How Airbus took off
Author : JumpCrisscross
Score : 137 points
Date : 2025-11-09 01:19 UTC (21 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (worksinprogress.co)
(TXT) w3m dump (worksinprogress.co)
| dandersch wrote:
| There was also residual suspicion of European industry among US
| airliners. [...] Against this backdrop, Airbus did
| everything it could to deemphasize its European heritage as it
| toured the US.
|
| The European tech industry on the other hand managed to curb that
| suspicion by becoming a complete non-threat.
| ma2rten wrote:
| Europe is quite conservative, in the sense that they would not
| invest billions into an unproven venture. It makes sense that it
| would excel at an industry that requires putting safety above
| everything.
| nrhrjrjrjtntbt wrote:
| The article says they did a lot of customer research and even
| lobbying, leading to fuel efficiency focus and reduced size,
| and sticking the finger up to various offended European
| countries (not taking delegates to US, eschewing RR engines).
| This seems like savvy being sustained over decades. It must be
| cultural.
| eastbound wrote:
| > and reduced size
|
| After launching, then dropping, the A380. Perhaps they didn't
| do enough customer interviews there.
| vanviegen wrote:
| Even if you ask every person to walk the earth what they
| want, that won't allow you to know future demand. The
| market shifted largely from hub-and-spoke to point-to-point
| during development. Without the benefit of hindsight, it
| must have looked like a solid bet.
| p_l wrote:
| When A380 started, and even when it was delivered first,
| the answers to "what will be the preferred form of airline
| transport network organisation, in detail" was not yet
| fully answered.
|
| And A380 simultaneously served as base (in many critical
| areas) for the quite quickly made A350 et al
| adrian_b wrote:
| This is explained in TFA.
|
| A380 was also the result of "customer interviews", but
| after all the years needed to complete the project the
| customers have changed their mind, preferring direct
| flights over hub-and-spoke flights.
| rsynnott wrote:
| > Europe is quite conservative, in the sense that they would
| not invest billions into an unproven venture.
|
| I mean, in this particular space:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concorde
| pqtyw wrote:
| IMHO Europe changed massively since the 80s and 90s in that
| regard, though.
|
| Arianespace was pretty much SpaceX of the 80s and there were
| quite a few tech companies back then. Due to various reasons
| stagnation entirely took over Europe after the start of this
| millennium. Hard to say why. Certainly not putting all the
| blame on them (since Britain isn't doing that great either)
| but I don't think especially the Euro and the EU becoming
| much stronger helped.
| ggm wrote:
| The chart of Airbus vs Boeing hull sales would have benefited
| from a center line Airbus above boeing below style.
|
| Stacked charts for two families work better that way than stack
| from baseline.
| quacked wrote:
| > Airbus prevailed because it was the least European version of a
| European industrial strategy project ever. It put its customer
| first, was uninterested in being seen as European, had leadership
| willing to risk political blowback in the pursuit of a good
| product, and operated in a unique industry
|
| This really buries the lede, given that over the past 40 years
| Boeing sawed off both its own feet and drank cyanide. Total
| cultural change at the executive level that prioritized returns
| over good engineering.
| eastbound wrote:
| I'm a staunch capitalist but Boeing vs Airbus is a
| demonstration of a big failure mode of capitalism (However,
| both have huge state intervention - Boeing's factories are
| placed to give jobs to populations, it's electoral choices, and
| that caused the airframe scandal).
| nocoiner wrote:
| What are you talking about? Which airframe scandal?
| mdorazio wrote:
| 737 MAX. That whole saga was because of Boeing trying
| really hard to not certify a new airframe so that they
| could quickly push out a competitor to A320 Neo. The result
| was hundreds of deaths.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| 737 Max was a compendium of failures. Airframe wasn't one
| of them. If anything, the 737 series' airframes are
| perfected to a fault.
| ViewTrick1002 wrote:
| Tons of problems that only are accepted due being
| grandfathered in.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Tons of problems that only are accepted due being
| grandfathered in_
|
| What are you basing this on?
| ViewTrick1002 wrote:
| For example a modern EICAS system is required today, and
| all modern passenger aircraft have one. Except the 737
| Max.
|
| The 737 Max 7 and 10 had to get a waiver due to not being
| certified in time by the hard requirement to have one
| when updating old types. Let alone certifying new types.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _a modern EICAS system is required today, and all
| modern passenger aircraft have one. Except the 737 Max_
|
| Instrumentation. Not airframe.
|
| Boeing's failure was in trying to make a great airframe
| compensate for failings in other systems.
| ViewTrick1002 wrote:
| It is a lackluster airframe but with an entire workforce
| certified to fly it and thus it is forced to stay around.
|
| Just look at the anti-ice issues preventing 737 Max 7 and
| 10 to be certified.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Just look at the anti-ice issues preventing 737 Max 7
| and 10 to be certified_
|
| Not airframe!
| ViewTrick1002 wrote:
| Ignore everything that makes the 737 a modern passenger
| aircraft and it's awesome!
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Ignore everything that makes the 737 a modern
| passenger aircraft and it's awesome!_
|
| You're moving the goalposts because you didn't understand
| what an airframe is.
| ViewTrick1002 wrote:
| The engine anti ice system are literally generic
| aerodynamic parts and control systems provided by Boeing.
|
| You know, part of the same assembly causing MCAS to
| exist.
|
| But that is of course not part of the airframe.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _that is of course not part of the airframe_
|
| Correct.
|
| The 737's airframe's excellence is the reason Boeing was
| loath to let it go. It's a really good airframe, and a
| market fit to boot for the transition from hub and spoke.
| A clean-sheet design for the 737 would look a lot like
| the 737. _That_ is what makes the shortcuts tempting.
|
| Engines, avionics and control software are distinct
| components and _not_ part of the airframe. (Debatable
| only on engine cowlings and mounts. Neither of which were
| relevant to the 737 Max's faults.)
| kuschku wrote:
| Considering the low ground clearance is one of the major
| issues of the 737 today (which lead to the whole MAX
| disaster), you'd have to replace the landing gear, and
| with that you'd also need to make changes to the airframe
| itself.
| miyuru wrote:
| Didn't the problems start when Boeing began using new
| engines on an old airframe for the Max?
|
| https://www.eetimes.com/software-wont-fix-boeings-faulty-
| air...
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| Yes. The problem wasn't the airframe, nor even frankly
| the engines, it was the combination plus the decision to
| fix an aerodynamic instability with an undocumented
| software patch.
| _DeadFred_ wrote:
| And putting certain related functionality behind a
| paywall.
| 05 wrote:
| Southwest's 737 MAX contract had a penalty clause of $1
| million per aircraft that would trigger if Boeing's
| delivery contract for the 737 MAX failed to meet certain
| standards, particularly Southwest's insistence that no
| flight simulator training be required for the MAX
|
| Meaning, the roots of the "no new type rating"
| requirement come from Southwest, not Boeing.
| rwmj wrote:
| Presumably Boeing weren't under duress when they signed
| the contract.
| elteto wrote:
| The Boeing execs had their bonuses held against their
| heads.
| getpost wrote:
| This is an interesting detail I had not heard. Can you
| link to a backstory on this? Why would such a contract
| ever be signed (especially for a technological product)?
| wood_spirit wrote:
| Wasn't there a scandal about doors falling off that came
| back to missing screws missed in cutback inspections that
| had been outsourced to a split off subsidiary or something
| like that?
| toast0 wrote:
| You've got the whole thing wrong.
|
| Only one door plug fell out. Other door plugs were
| inspected but there was no reporting on their condition.
| The door plug seems to have fallen out due to lack of
| _nuts_ , not missing screws. There was rework due to poor
| work from a spun out former subsidiary that required the
| door plug to be opened, but I think? the door plug was
| opened and closed by Boeing, and not properly recorded by
| Boeing in the work log, resulting in no
| inspection/verification and nobody else noticed the
| missing nuts either; IIRC the opening was recorded 'in
| the wrong place' and the closing wasn't recorded at all.
| I wouldn't call that a 'cutback inspection'
|
| I don't remember which party is responsible for
| installing the interior trim that covers the door plug,
| but their checklist must not have included verifying that
| the door plug nuts and their retaining wire were in
| place, either.
| eastbound wrote:
| In 2013, they externalized the construction of the metal
| rings that make the body. It was supposed to be CNC'd, but
| the provider obviously made them manually, with all the
| mistakes that entails, including sloppy sawing and cutting
| holes in the wrong places. It was validated for production,
| because of political pressure to not blame the provider.
| Boeing re-cut the holes in the right places, making them
| twice weaker.
|
| So yes, the MAX isn't the first unsafe plane of Boeing.
| That it wasn't proven that it caused accidents, doesn't
| mean it was safe.
|
| And there are countless other affairs like this. The
| lithium batteries.
| lazide wrote:
| They became monopolies/state sponsored entities.
|
| It happens everywhere under every market system.
|
| Typically, in most capitalist systems they get (eventually)
| broken up as it stifles competition, which (non-winning)
| capitalists don't like. Same as in Soviet systems a patron
| gets too fat/corrupt and other patrons start vying for
| attention.
|
| But that is far from certain, and aerospace & military has
| always been rife with this issue. The 'merge until they
| become too big/important to fail' playbook isn't just for
| banks!
|
| Messerschmitt, Sukoi, Tupolev, Airbus, Boeing, Lockheed,
| McDonnell-Douglas, etc.
| CPLX wrote:
| This really isn't an accurate description of what happened.
| In fact, the contrast between Boeing and Airbus is
| instructive. Boeing is exactly what happens in the event of
| unregulated capitalism, which is endless mergers and
| attempts to exploit monopoly power and relentless efforts
| to satisfy the financial sector.
|
| The end state of unregulated capitalism for a company like
| Boeing is a "capital-light" company based entirely on
| monopoly power and relationships that hardly manufactures
| anything at all, having outsourced everything to
| subsidiaries and suppliers to satisfy the return on capital
| requirements of Wall Street.
|
| The Airbus approach is a clear contrast to this. The fact
| that Boeing has imploded while Airbus has thrived is, in
| fact, a very helpful counterpoint to reflexive and idiotic
| market fundamentalist ideology.
| lazide wrote:
| Airbus literally is the result of mergers of many
| countries aircraft manufacturers
| [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airbus], including - from
| that list, Messerschmitt.
|
| In capitalist systems. Boeing is also still a going
| concern, and is a major competitor to Airbus. It hasn't
| 'imploded'.
|
| It is having some difficulty right now - but more due to
| the entire US economy going through a 'narcissistic'
| phase.
|
| Airbus has plenty of issues a decade or two ago,
| including very similar issues to what Boeing has recently
| been going through.
| CPLX wrote:
| The problems with Boeing aren't generic. They're created
| by people, and policies.
|
| https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/its-time-to-
| nationalize-a...
| lazide wrote:
| The problems Airbus had were also created by people and
| policies?
|
| History rhymes for a reason.
| CPLX wrote:
| I don't think the problems Airbus have had are comparable
| to the likely criminal, and clearly negligent, meltdown
| that Boeing has had.
| lazide wrote:
| [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airbus_affair]
|
| [http://www.crashdehabsheim.net/CRenglish%20phot.pdf]
|
| [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_accidents_and_inci
| dent...]
|
| [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_France_Flight_447] -
| similar type of issue (likely) as the MAX problems.
| Improper training + bad sensors + design that is too
| prone to problems.
|
| Just to name a few.
|
| Potentially worse.
| _DeadFred_ wrote:
| Boeing was also pressured to outsource world wide, to
| spread around the grease to countries with large aircraft
| orders. They they didn't outsource because it made sense.
| They outsourced to get the sales guy his sale, and
| management their numbers to unlock compensation.
|
| My buddy refused to work there just because of the
| nightmare of trying to certify it all/ensure compliance
| at every point.
| CPLX wrote:
| That's really not accurate. Yes, that is a thing that
| _also_ happened, but that 's not why Spirit Aerosystems
| existed, which is what I'm talking about.
|
| It's because Wall Street demands returns on capital in a
| way that's fundamentally incompatible with hardcore high
| tech manufacturing.
| locallost wrote:
| My overall feeling is "did they take off, or did Boeing
| stumble?", but looking at that chart of deliveries it seems
| Airbus started taking off almost 25 years ago. So the recent
| struggles of Boeing would really be just the straw that broke the
| camel's back. My guess is Airbus will dominate for the next few
| decades.
| nocoiner wrote:
| I think this is about right. About a quarter-century ago,
| airbus finally became a manufacturer that could go head to head
| with the 737 and win more often than not. Since then they've
| generally gone from strength to strength while Boeing has been
| primarily concerned with financial engineering.
| NewLogic wrote:
| It is quite simple, they had the more recent cleansheet single
| aisle airframe design with enough ground clearance for modern
| high bypass engine designs. This has baked in a lot of inherent
| efficiencies including manufacturability meanwhile Boeing
| leadership refused to invest in a 737 replacement needed in the
| 2000s.
| kotaKat wrote:
| Don't forget the greatest stumble with the Bombardier CSeries.
|
| I feel like if Boeing shut their mouth and bit their tongue at
| a little casual dumping they wouldn't have ended up with Airbus
| taking over the CS100 and adding yet another directly
| competitive aircraft into an "all Airbus" lineup that Boeing
| didn't have.
| thesumofall wrote:
| I worked for Airbus a long time ago, and obviously I have some
| rose-tinted glasses, but what stands out in my memories:
|
| - While the French and Germans love to hate each other, they
| culturally complement each other very well. I don't think Airbus
| could have happened as a purely French or German project (and
| yes, the UK and Spain are also part of Airbus but are much less
| visible)
|
| - Despite being a highly political entity, you wouldn't feel any
| of that day to day. Even up to the highest management levels, it
| felt like an engineering company focused on incredibly hard
| engineering challenges. Every once in a while, there was fighting
| over which country would get which work share for a new project,
| but it felt more like internal teams pushing their pet peeves
| rather than external political influence
|
| - It was a truly international company. My first team had eight
| colleagues based in four countries. To make it all work, they had
| some very early video conferencing systems where the equipment
| would take up entire side rooms.
| rkomorn wrote:
| Your note on politics is interesting because my anecdotal
| experience was quite different.
|
| I worked at an Airbus offshoot in Silicon Valley and my visit
| to Toulouse for a bunch of meetings with the teams working on
| new tech and AI things were somewhat shocking.
|
| The amount of sniping in meetings, and the amount of post-
| meeting behind the back sniping was somewhat shocking.
|
| This was somewhat mirrored to a lesser extent even in our
| videoconf meetings and other collaborations.
|
| It left me wondering how a group of people who seem to think so
| poorly of each other and work so dysfunctionally could actually
| come together to build some of the most amazing machines on
| earth (because modern airliners truly are such things).
|
| The best take I could come up with was "Maybe all the adversity
| and mistrust means the end up building things that survive
| intense scrutiny."
| donkeybeer wrote:
| Was that country political politics or office politics
| politics?
| rkomorn wrote:
| Office politics, I guess, though it was kind of tinged
| since the offices were in different countries, but it still
| was Airbus-level, not nation-level, I guess.
| marhee wrote:
| Maybe the real reason is more related to Price's law/Pareto's
| principle, loosely meaning that 90% of the work is done by
| 10% of the people. In other words, in large companies most
| perons do not contribute much, at least not at the same time.
| rkomorn wrote:
| Maybe, yeah.
|
| And it's also quite possible that my view (which was across
| a slice of new-technology stuff hosted by the "innovation"
| arm) was skewed, and things aren't the same elsewhere in
| the company.
|
| I just remember being shocked by the negativity.
| thesumofall wrote:
| If we talk about the same ,,innovation" offshoot, it happened
| right after I left the company. I think the cultural change
| that the top leadership at that time wanted to push was just
| too much to not cause a backlash. A new CTO who was perceived
| as an outsider, a somewhat implied message that the Silicon
| Valley's way of working was superior to the company's
| traditional approach, and the internal realization that
| Airbus started to lag behind leading to the typical defensive
| behaviors. Curious how the culture evolved since then
| rkomorn wrote:
| I left A^3 (or Acubed, groan) 5 years ago, to relocate
| overseas, so I don't know how it's been since. There was
| definitely a bit of a "Silicon Valley knows best" attitude
| that I didn't buy into (because the people I met at Airbus
| were pretty damn sharp ... while I felt very overpaid, but
| anyway).
|
| There was always some talk of maneuvering around other
| groups who wanted our project or wanted to beat us to the
| punch or whatever, which felt a bit pointlessly
| unproductive to me, so I did my best to ignore it and try
| to just deliver.
|
| I did get to meet some cool people, though, including
| Grazia Vittadini, so I can't complain.
| trollbridge wrote:
| That level of sniping also means that groupthink can't
| happen, which is a major problem at Boeing: nobody wanted to
| speak up about obvious problems, and those that did saw their
| careers ended.
| rbanffy wrote:
| It's fair to describe Boeing's problems as being caused by
| Boeing now being actually McDonnell Douglas. It's only
| called Boeing because MD had a terrible reputation.
| raverbashing wrote:
| While there is some amount of sniping and banter everywhere
| whenever Americans and French will have different ways of
| expressing " this is 90% great" or "this is only 10% usable"
|
| Americans might praise a bad solution one moment (for
| politeness) and turn their back on you the other while French
| will say "this is ok" while they are deeply enjoying it
| rkomorn wrote:
| IDK, I'm French, and worked in the US and I can't say my
| perception of the US way of working generally matches
| yours.
|
| I've never worked in France so I can't compare there.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _I don't think Airbus could have happened as a purely French
| or German project_
|
| _Cf_ Arianespace.
| wqaatwt wrote:
| Well they had a good run in 80s and 90s now they are
| massively behind competition and being kept alive by
| government payouts (to be fair much like France itself..)
| nolok wrote:
| France is being kept alive by paying itself? Makes no
| sense.
|
| Also arianespace group has 60% of their revenue from the
| development of the m51 nuclear launcher, the rocket thing
| is their side show and a way to subsidize our nuclear
| launcher development not the other way around.
|
| Also ag studied a reusable launcher in the early 2000s and
| found it not viable economically, because it wasn't, to
| make it work space x had to have massive government
| subsidies in guaranteed launch AND starlink which was
| essentially let our own investors and the dod feed the
| finance of space x until it's viable. Which is a good
| strategy mind you, but as a result pointing the finger at
| ag being supported by government funding as if it was a bad
| sign is rather absurd.
| littlestymaar wrote:
| > France is being kept alive by paying itself? Makes no
| sense.
|
| For the past 18 years at least, France has been trapped
| in an economic stagnation driven by terrible economic
| policies (as if trying to outcompete eastern Europe on
| cost wasn't a great idea). The only thing that keeps the
| economist from collapsing entirely is the perpetual
| stimulus from public spending using foreign loans. (This
| also will probably stop being sufficient soon since the
| governing party seems to be obsessed by the idea of
| reducing public spending instead of fixing their economic
| policy).
| nolok wrote:
| Well I would disagree with that and laugh at the fact
| that this exact analysis has been published by The
| Economist and similar for the past 50 years, in fact for
| the first time France unemployment numbers have gone
| below the numbers they climbed to in the 90s, and in 2020
| for the first time since the turn of the century our
| deficit was reaching a point allowing our debt to start
| lowering instead of climbing, and was stopped by a
| combination of both covid and then the energy crisis and
| the cover offered to french people.
|
| We do have issues and for the past 3 years they've been
| amplified by our political standoff (parliament cut in
| three third and none agree to work with the others), but
| the core of our economic woes is from pensions.
| littlestymaar wrote:
| > Well I would disagree with that and laugh at the fact
| that this exact analysis has been published by The
| Economist and similar for the past 50 years
|
| I'd be happy to live in a timeline where the Economist
| criticizes the bullshit that "supply chain economics" is,
| but if you paid attention you'd be aware that it's not
| really their editorial line.
|
| > fact for the first time France unemployment numbers
| have gone below the numbers they climbed to in the 90s
|
| You should thank the boomers for retiring, not the
| economic policy. (By the way, employment went up in
| pretty much all of Europe for the 2010-2020 period while
| the economy stagnated in most places but the east)
|
| > We do have issues and for the past 3 years they've been
| amplified by our political standoff (parliament cut in
| three third and none agree to work with the others
|
| Standoff caused exactly by the government dogmatic stand
| over their failed economic policy ...
|
| > but the core of our economic woes is from pensions.
|
| It is not, this is government narrative. The "pension
| problem" is merely an economic activity problem. When the
| real wages go down (which is did in France since 2017)
| while pensions are inflation adjusted, obviously the
| share of income that goes through pensions increases but
| that's not a "pensions problem" it's a wage issue (and
| economy health issue).
|
| In fact, public spending per capita is in the middle of
| what remwins of the EU15 (just above all other
| Mediterranean countries and below all the others). The
| reason why the spendings per capita ratio is too high is
| not because the spendings are too high, but because the
| GDP is far too low due to inept policies.
| rvnx wrote:
| You forgot to mention that in 2020 currencies were
| devalued through severe QE, which means it is easier in
| 2025 to pay back 2M EUR than it was in 2020
| littlestymaar wrote:
| Inflation != currency devaluation and France had a pretty
| tame inflation compared to many of its neighbors
| (significantly less than Belgium for instance), which
| again is a good illustration that inflation has nothing
| to do with the money supply or the value of a currency,
| no matter how prevalent this myth is.
| rvnx wrote:
| Check the money supply during COVID, it was insane.
| littlestymaar wrote:
| Check the money supply after the financial crisis, it was
| insane too and the inflation remained below target for a
| decade.
|
| Covid induced inflation has nothing to do with the money
| supply and all to do with supply chain disruption.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Inflation != currency devaluation_
|
| Neither which is the same as expanding the monetary base
| (debasement if you want to be spicy).
|
| An economy with a shrinking money supply can experience
| inflation and devaluation relative to other currencies.
| An economy with a growing money supply can experience
| deflation and a strong currency.
| littlestymaar wrote:
| > Neither which is the same as expanding the monetary
| base (debasement if you want to be spicy).
|
| "debasement" proper is also something else.
|
| > An economy with a shrinking money supply can experience
| inflation and devaluation relative to other currencies.
| An economy with a growing money supply can experience
| deflation and a strong currency.
|
| Yes. And an economy with a growing money supply can
| experience inflation and having a strong currency at the
| same time (see what happened to the US and the US Dollar
| in the first half of 2022).
| wqaatwt wrote:
| > France is being kept alive by paying itself? Makes no
| sense.
|
| Yes, by borrowing. Any meaningful reforms seems
| infeasible due to social and political reasons.
|
| > Also arianespace group has 60% of their revenue from
| the development of the m51 nuclear launcher
|
| Yes, so we agree its hardly much more than a government
| military contractor making its money from legacy products
| and not some sort of an innovative company.
| saubeidl wrote:
| I wouldn't exactly call the world's fastest ballistic
| missile (Mach 25!) a legacy product...
| rbanffy wrote:
| That kind of delta-v makes it almost an orbital launcher.
| holoduke wrote:
| It's just an orbital launch vehicle. Something the US can
| produce by dozens per day it needed. Whereas the French
| have a stockpile which is no more than 50 with a
| production rate of maybe 1 or 2 per month.
| saubeidl wrote:
| The US one is slower...
| Xixi wrote:
| NASA once offered the UK to launch its satellites almost
| for free. That offer was rescinded as soon as the UK
| abandoned its national space program. [1]
|
| From a European perspective, it's impossible to look at the
| current situation and believe it would be the same without
| Ariane 6, even if Ariane 6 itself isn't particularly
| competitive. Sovereign access to space is invaluable. Once
| you lose it, you hand an extraordinary amount of leverage
| to the White House. And make no mistake: that leverage will
| be used, whatever the color of the administration.
|
| [1] https://curious-droid.com/323/black-arrow-lipstick-
| rocket-br...
| Epa095 wrote:
| How would you say their cultures compliment each other? I would
| be interested to hear more concrete, and especially how it ends
| up when you mix them.
| mettamage wrote:
| Seconding this, I'm Dutch and I still struggle to see how
| they'd complement each other.
| hexbin010 wrote:
| Well that's just because you hate both the French and the
| Germans ;)
| n1b0m wrote:
| French engineers were known for their willingness to embrace
| advanced, high-risk technologies to gain a decisive advantage
| in the aerospace market.
|
| French influence drove Airbus's early focus on understanding
| customer needs and adapting to market requirements. Early on,
| the company adopted English as its working language and U.S.
| measurements to appeal to a wider range of airline customers.
|
| German engineers brought a reputation for meticulous
| attention to detail, efficiency, and robust industrial
| processes, ensuring reliable and high-quality production.
|
| Germany's strong engineering foundation provided the
| technical discipline needed to standardize components and
| organize the complex cross-border manufacturing process.
| thesumofall wrote:
| Yes. Also the way how internal collaboration works. A lot
| of focus on relationship building and pre-alignments vs a
| content-first approach (,,people will accept it if it's
| just correct enough"). In any real-world situation that
| matters it will always take a bit of both
| mmooss wrote:
| > Early on, the company adopted English as its working
| language and U.S. measurements to appeal to a wider range
| of airline customers.
|
| Airbus uses US measurements - i.e., not the metric system?
| neves wrote:
| I'm speechless
| tim333 wrote:
| They use SAE nuts and bolts. "Society of Automotive
| Engineers and refers to the system of inch-based
| fasteners used primarily in North America"
| mmooss wrote:
| Is that the standard in the airline industry? For
| example, does Embraer use SAE too? Lockheed (I thought
| the US military used metric)?
| Sprotch wrote:
| What's your source for that? It reads like a cliche,
| especially when you know about the arguably stronger
| engineering background in France when it comes to
| aerospace.
| constantcrying wrote:
| I have met many former Airbus engineers and former Airbus
| contractors. Every single time I have heard nothing but bad
| things about the company.
|
| Sure, selection bias, but everything I heard is _exactly_ what
| I would expect from a large corporation, split across a
| continent at its worst. Long, tedious decision processes which
| are completely opaque together with a culture, where management
| sees it as their responsibility to create a large bureocratic
| processes to navigate the extremely challenging landscape,
| where culture and geography clash. Mind you these are
| complaints from people still working in Aerospace.
|
| In general I have always had terrible experience the more
| diverse and intercultural Teams got. The best teams I
| experienced are homogeneous, ideally only including people from
| a small geographic region, with very similar sensibilities.
| Even inside a nation regional sensibilities can be a challenge.
| thesumofall wrote:
| Super sorry that these have been your experiences. Working
| for a very different company now, I again ended up in a
| highly international setting and - with good leadership - it
| can be incredibly enriching (the company is the result of
| several global mergers). Unfortunately, the way it works in
| many companies nowadays, the only situation where teams
| experience working with other countries are in settings that
| are imbalanced from the start (e.g., after offshoring)
| constantcrying wrote:
| Dealing with offshoring was very tedious, as you now have
| even more layers. Digital only communication, time
| differences, etc.
|
| But in person is also very bad. I never was part of a well
| functioning multi cultural team. And every homogenous team
| I have been in was well functioning. At this point I will
| actively seek out employment in teams where I am only among
| native speakers and as far as possible only among natives.
|
| >Super sorry
|
| What are you sorry about? I quit the job, partly because I
| couldn't stand having half a dozen different communication
| barriers.
|
| >it can be incredibly enriching
|
| I have never found a single positive aspect. None of the
| multi cultural teams have "enriched" me in any way, most
| often they made me dislike the other cultures.
| sandworm101 wrote:
| That started before airbus. People forget that Aerospatiale (a
| founder of airbus) was a partner in Concord (aka Concorde).
| That is where cross-boarder aerospace really got started. Many
| saw such partnerships as key to keeping Europe together
| politically. Without Concorde-Airbus, europe might have looked
| very different.
| Animats wrote:
| It's going to be interesting to watch COMAC really get going.
| They've been struggling for 17 years now to get the C919 into
| service. It's still using a US engine (currently embargoed by
| Trump, but that may change). The Aero Engine Corporation of China
| has built an engine which is supposed to be flight tested "soon".
| pyrale wrote:
| This article is pushing its narrative so hard that it feels like
| the author's selection process was "I want to say something about
| Europe, which company would support my claims".
|
| It's quite hard to understand whether the author wants to focus
| on Airbus (in which case, the article spends way too much time
| comparing EU/US and talking about Boeing), Europe (in which case
| it's missing plenty of other companies/sectors) or industrial
| policy (why speak about Europe at all? Chinese companies are a
| much more recent example of succesful industrial policies).
| overfeed wrote:
| I would love to read an indepth article comparing how the US is
| whiffing EVs compared to China. Manufacturer attitudes,
| protectionism, government policies on vehicles and the
| background on renewable energy.
| Jyaif wrote:
| > They also mastered the world of DC lobbying, successfully
| outmaneuvering Boeing and Lockheed's attempts to use anti-trust
| regulations to shut the European entrant out of the US market.
|
| No amount of engineering can compete with good old bribes.
| littlestymaar wrote:
| This is tangential to the main point of the article, but this
| concluding sentence annoyed me greatly:
|
| > Governments are generally better at supporting companies in
| established markets where innovation takes place slowly and
| incrementally. This is likely why state-backed efforts have found
| it easier to be competitive against aerospace companies than
| Silicon Valley giants working at breakneck pace
|
| I always finds it fascinating that companies like Facebook,
| Google, Amazon or Microsoft (granted the later isn't a "silicon
| valley giant" proper) managed to build a narrative portraying
| themselves as "innovative companies" when they are the opposite
| of that: they are, and have been for almost two decades now or
| even more for Microsoft, very close to the complacent and short-
| term-profit-maximizer Boeing portrayed in this article.
|
| They just happen to benefit from a much stronger network effect
| than Boeing, and work in a business where economies of scale are
| insane.
| Ekaros wrote:
| When you really think of those companies they mostly seem
| stagnant. They buy other companies, but for innovative company
| with essentially unlimited amounts of resources. Wouldn't you
| expect a big innovation at least say every other year?
| Peteragain wrote:
| There is also the idea that innovation is hard in established
| organisations. William Langewiesche's book "fly by wire"
| highlights some of the improvements that Boeing no dought knew
| about, but hadn't got round to. They were busy playing catch-up.
| jen729w wrote:
| > Europe is a graveyard of failed national champions ... Airbus
| is the rare success story.
|
| Oh, come now.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_companies_in_E...
| jemmyw wrote:
| They mentioned Concorde in that list of failures. But while it
| was a financial failure in of itself, it was probably the
| precursor to Airbus - a strong collaboration between the UK and
| France to save their failing airliner businesses. I doubt it
| was an overall failure.
| rvnx wrote:
| It is like saying that the tunnel that links the France and
| Great Britain was a failure
| FabHK wrote:
| And just some context on the technological side:
|
| 20 Concordes were built, 1 lost, for a 5% hull loss rate.
|
| 386 DC-10 were built, 32 hull losses, for an 8.3% hull loss
| rate.
|
| 561 A300 were built, 25 hull losses, for a 4.4% hull loss
| rate.
|
| 1574 B747 were built, 65 hull losses, for a 4.1% hull loss
| rate.
|
| Now, that's not normalised by "years active", and some hull
| losses are not attributable to the aircraft at all (e.g.
| terrorist attacks), but basically the Concorde safety record
| was on par to jets from that generation (introduced around
| 1970).
| rbanffy wrote:
| The Concorde numbers are so low the confidence interval is
| much larger than the others. It could be a freak accident
| there was only one catastrophic failure. And, mind you,
| that catastrophic failure was a pretty freakish accident
| itself.
| mrtksn wrote:
| The article has a weird defensive tone, as if its not about
| Airbus but about feeling good for USA by giving it one to
| Europe(but claiming superiority on everything else).
|
| It's so strange to say that Europe doesn't have successful
| companies considering that EU is actually exporting much more
| stuff to USA and its the primary issue in recent politics and
| the Trump administration is trying to fix with tariffs.
|
| Airbus is merely a rare example of intergovernmental
| collaboration to create a free market champion. There are not
| many like that, in US arguably a similar attempt to distribute
| defence contract between states caused the downfall of Boing
| once they adopted the practices through federal government
| orchestrated merger with McDonnell Douglas.
|
| Maybe the author is actually trying to process the perceived US
| government incompetence with the libertarian idea that
| governments are incompetent by default in the light of existing
| contradiction like Airbus.
| immibis wrote:
| Well economic success is not measured in goods and services,
| but in US dollars. And since the USA prints US dollars, it
| automatically wins, and every other country is inferior.
| After all, the map is the territory.
| mrtksn wrote:
| Right, everything must about increasing the scoreboard in
| the bank UI.
| carlhjerpe wrote:
| "the rare European company that is better than its American
| rival" this is a shitpost
| s-macke wrote:
| I stopped reading the article after this sentence. Now I am
| scanning the comments.
| rbanffy wrote:
| It'd be fair to say it's one of the few government-sponsored
| multinational companies that thrived. There was a time
| European governments pushed for strategic mergers to better
| compete against American companies.
| 4ndrewl wrote:
| This seems a little disingenuous - the US taxpayer will always
| keep Boeing solvent, even if they were down to selling one 737
| per year.
| InTheArena wrote:
| Which is why Airbus is around today. The amount of launch aide
| (including Marshall plan dollars!) that the European
| governments flushed into Airbus to keep them afloat for years
| is why they are still around.\
| anovikov wrote:
| It's simply a company that operates in a rare industry where
| safety and reliability is more important than time to market or
| cost. Which makes risk-averse, hyper-conservative and consensus-
| seeking European culture at a relative advantage vs American
| "fake it till you make it" one.
| numpad0 wrote:
| Isn't Airbus also just succeedingcompany to Sud Aviation and
| Aerospatiale? They've done Caravel jetliner, Exocet missile, Puma
| helicopter, early Ariane rockets, etc etc, by the time they
| started working on A300... Having such experiences would
| certainly help designing and delivering great airliners.
| prasadjoglekar wrote:
| There's a very nice video from Mustard about the Airbus story.
|
| https://youtu.be/ln-ffJM9sJc
| lorenzohess wrote:
| It started its engines and left the ground
| TheMagicHorsey wrote:
| I wouldn't say so confidently that Airbus is better than Boeing.
| Its just better than Boeing at THIS moment. They've been trading
| places over the decades. A company selling commercial airliners
| is really only as good as the order book for its latest aircraft.
| And a single stumble in developing a model can sink your
| orderbook for an entire decade or more.
|
| Ultimately both Boeing and Airbus are moribund bureaucracies that
| survive only with the dual intravenous injections of state
| subsidies and duopoly.
|
| Making commercial aircraft is a capital intensive process, but
| its ripe for disruption. With China on the rise we may get a
| third competitor on the scene with completely different cost
| structure.
|
| There's also disruption coming from down below. New tools
| (including AI and more sophisticated manufacturing automation)
| are making it possible to enter the market with shorter
| timelines. If regulators can get off their asses, we might
| actually see the duopoly disrupted by new national and
| subnational champions. More will be better than two.
| trollbridge wrote:
| It may be painful to admit, but the Airbus model simply works
| better than the Boeing model. Whatever advantages America has,
| they don't apply to commercial/passenger aerospace anymore.
| neuroelectron wrote:
| Tldr: turbine engines
| JCM9 wrote:
| Boeing had a tough patch, but anyone that follows aviation knows
| Airbus has had its fair share of massive screw-ups over the years
| too.
| InTheArena wrote:
| A quick control-F didn't find the name John Leahy. Without that
| part of the story, I think you really miss what took Airbus from
| an also-run European institution to a global force. Some of his
| story there is really something.
| scrubs wrote:
| I think more truth would be shown by critiquing Boeing's
| organizational culture that allowed this decline. In particular
| does it have the chops to get over its lethargy? No doubt boeing
| has earned a negative assessment. Now what?
|
| My recollection was Airbus had boeing at a competitive
| disadvantage and a number of factors combined to optimize for
| short-term benefit not medium to long with severe consequences.
| So what about that boeing?
| _DeadFred_ wrote:
| Bribes. Europe has (or had in the past) very different rules
| about bribery, especially overseas.
|
| I know the American company I worked for lost bids we had won
| when we refused the kickback schemes the government that granted
| the bids expected us to include. Some American companies
| package/tie deals to other deals with other foreign entities so
| that the kickbacks happen on the side, but it's nothing like the
| bribery the Europeans did that we had to compete with.
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