To analyse. It’s a record. Over the whole of 2021, Airbus recorded 4.2 billion euros in profits. Last year, the European aircraft manufacturer was busy delivering 611 aircraft, 45 more than the previous year. A good result heralds even more staggering ones, subject to the consequences of the sanctions linked to the war in Ukraine. In 2022, Airbus already plans to deliver more than 720 aircraft.
On the other side of the Atlantic, rival Boeing is still struggling. He announced a loss of 4.29 billion dollars (regarding 3.8 billion euros). A lesser evil compared to 2020, when the hole reached $11.9 billion. Last year, the American manufacturer saw its orders start to rise once more, with 535 net contracts. On the other hand, it remained very behind in terms of deliveries with only 340 devices delivered to customers. A bad deal, because it is on delivery that the aircraft manufacturers are paid by the companies.
In 2021, Airbus not only signaled the end of the crisis and filled its coffers, it also consolidated its installation on the roof of the world. However, the European aircraft manufacturer has been the world number one in aeronautics for three years now. The overtaking, the “Overtaking” as the Italians say, intervened three years ago, but Airbus did not make much of it. To be the winner “that doesn’t exist in the industry, you always have to remain humble and careful”, said Guillaume Faury, CEO of Airbus, Friday, February 18 on BFM-TV. The discretion of the Toulouse aircraft manufacturer is nothing new. He was thus careful not to comment on the setbacks of his American competitor, whose medium-haul 737 MAX was banned from flying for twenty-two months following two air disasters which claimed 346 victims, passengers and crew members, in 2018 and 2019.
Preserving the duopoly
Airbus and Boeing have reigned supreme over air transport for nearly thirty years. Their well-understood interest is not so much to be number one as to do everything to preserve their duopoly. In Toulouse, the primary concern is to “produce the 7,000 aircraft already on order, to which will be added 7,000 more over the next ten years”. In Seattle, we do not say anything else with 5,179 devices on order as of January 31. In recent years, the two competitors have brought their few competitors into line. Airbus has bought the CSeries from Quebec Bombardier to make the A220, its entry-level medium-haul. Boeing, for its part, tried to get its hands on the Brazilian Embraer before finally giving up.
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