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Posted on 10/10/2006 7:41:05 AM PDT by lowbuck
Job cuts threatened as Airbus chief quits
A planned meeting between unions and bosses at Airbus has been cancelled following the resignation of the plane-maker's chief executive, it was announced today. advertisement
Officials expressed disappointment and raised fresh concerns about job losses after the new head warned of "painful" cuts.
Louis Gallois, who took over last night after the resignation of Christian Streiff, said a recovery plan for Airbus would involve job losses.
"There will be job cuts," he told France's Europe 1 radio station, saying they were more likely to be in administrative and managerial roles. Airbus sources say workers at the wing plant in Broughton, North Wales, will be spared the cull.
Mr Gallois added that the sliding dollar is an even bigger threat to Europe's ailing plane-maker than costly delays in the A380 superjumbo project.
"Airbus's principal handicap vis-a-vis Boeing is the collapsing dollar," he said. The currency hedge book that has shielded Airbus until now is rapidly expiring, creating severe strains for a company that pays costs in euros but sells jets in dollars.
He added: "We have to ask questions about the plants: we cannot live with two sites that each share all the assembly lines, but nothing is decided yet."
The comments suggest Mr Gallois aims to press ahead with plans to halt work on the A380 in Hamburg at the cost of 2,500 jobs, switching the entire operation to Toulouse. Analysts say it was a clash over Hamburg that led to Monday's abrupt resignation of Mr Streiff.
Mr Streiff described the Airbus structure as "not fit for a company in crisis" where fast decisions were needed. "I hope my resignation will prove a salutary shock," he told Le Figaro. "The scale of the challenge makes it impossible to proceed with the current mode of governance. I needed operational powers but it became clear as the time went by that I was getting nowhere."
Mr Streiff's acid remarks are sure to fuel concerns that Airbus is unmanageable as currently structured, an anachronism from a long-past political era. Mr Gallois is expected to push for many of the same changes but with much more tact and political savvy, ensuring that sacrifices are evenly spread. "We cannot ask everything from one country and nothing from the other."
Mr Gallois's appointment means Airbus will at last have one pilot instead of two and brings the fiefdom directly under EADS control for the first time. However, it is far from clear where EADS itself is going.
The German media was abuzz with reports yesterday of a "secret plan" for Berlin to take a stake in EADS to balance the French state holding of 15pc plus 2.3pc through Caisse des Depots,.
A spokesman for Chancellor Angela Merkel said it was a possibility but "there's nothing concrete yet."
French plotting to gain dominant control of the twin-headed venture over the last two years is a key cause oft the management breakdown. It now apperas that EADS faces creeping nationalization, with the added twist of Russia state involvement after the Kremlin's VTB bank quietly ammassed 5pc of the stock over the summer.
That my friends is the truth of the matter. The Germans have been waiting for the Frogs to stick the knife in, now, let the war begin!!
Rove's and Bush's fault or plan in action.
If you want on or off my aerospace ping list, please contact me by Freep mail.
I will admit to feeling some degree of sympathy for the rank and file because the management could not figure out how to work together, although I am sure they belong to some kind of union and that always contributes to the problems.
You cannot run an aerospace company like a social work program. Results do matter in the real world.
Good God. That is plain ugly. I am sure it will look better painted up in some kind of glossy color, but...blech!
The rank and file,most likely,believe that the President is the most dangerous man to have ever walked this earth....with Ronald Reagan coming in a close second.
I don't feel the slightest sympathy for them.
Neither Western nor Central Europe is our friend.
Then maybe Louis Gallois is not the homme for the job.
See his CV here: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1716808/posts?page=27#27
Germany should just conquer France, again, and dictate a solution.
Just in case you missed this thread.
If Airbus executives had as many a$$holes as they do excuses, they wouldn't be so full of $hit.
A 240-ton Vienna sausage.
Come on...I did say SOME degree...it was strictly for some guy on the line.
I am not on the side of the Euroweenie socialists. Believe me, I think they sleep in beds of their own making, but that doesn't prevent me from feeling SOME degree of pity for people when the chickens come home to roost and they are finally confronted with the downside of their beliefs. Heck, I often feel that way towards just about anyone who is not smart enough, conscientious enough or motivated enough to realize in advance the ramifications of their actions on the day the piper shows up for payment.
I work in medicine, and even though you see people come in who smoked cigarettes their entire life, and they knew full well the risks, you still feel sympathy for them when they find out they have lung cancer. It is just human.
It is butt ugly. Looks like a flying pig.
Years ago in college a fraternity brother explained "brotherhood" to me. He said "brotherhood was in, until the girls got in the picture".
The EU is just the same. The French are all for it when the French get all the goodies. When the French look to lose out, forget about all that "brotherhood, fraternity, etc" bullcrap.
Election time soon in Frogland and the Socialists will not want to give a bit on jobs. The Germans have invested a lot of money in this "jobs program" and will not want to give an inch.
I think I should get the oil and popcorn so I can watch the show in style.
Is the departing guy the one who shot his mouth off last week about Airbus needed 15 years to catch Boeing?
Thanks. I didn't miss this thread.
I was the second freeper to reply to it:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1716841/posts?page=2#2
No. That was a totally different thread. Note the thread numbers 1716808 and 1716841
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1716808/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1716841/posts?page=2#2
Looks like the Germans are facing a two front war, with the French and Russian governments ganging up on the German workers.
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