Airbus, an EADS joint company with headquarters in Toulouse, France, joined the commercial aircraft market in 1972. Back then, said T. Allan McArtor, chair of Airbus North America Holdings, Inc., nobody thought the company could compete. Airbus Chair T. Allan McArtor says sales have gone from 18 percent of new aircraft orders in 1995 to 54 percent in 2004. "People snickered, and some outright laughed, but looking back, it's easy to understand why," McArtor said. "This upstart was taking on business icons—Boeing, and in those days, other formidable competitors like Douglas Aircraft and Lockheed." As recently as 1995, Airbus had...