Airbus announced that 15,000 jobs will be cut from its international workforce on Tuesday [June 30]. The decision is substantially based on the impact of the coronavirus pandemic. It is also a result of the company’s expectation that air travel will only return to pre-COVID-19 levels in the next 4 years.
Airbus designs and manufactures commercial aircraft.
This is historically the largest downsize the company has ever made according to The New York Times. Job cuts will take place in operations in Germany, Britain, France and Spain.
In a statement, Airbus said: ‘The commercial aircraft business activity has dropped by close to 40% in recent months as the industry faces an unprecedented crisis. Commercial aircraft production rates have been adapted accordingly.
‘Airbus is grateful for the government support that has enabled the Company to limit these necessary adaptation measures. However, with air traffic not expected to recover to pre-COVID levels before 2023 and potentially as late as 2025, Airbus now needs to take additional measures to reflect the post-COVID-19 industry outlook.’
Airbus CEO Guillaume Faury said: ‘Airbus is facing the gravest crisis this industry has ever experienced.’
‘The measures we have taken so far have enabled us to absorb the initial shock of this global pandemic. Now, we must ensure that we can sustain our enterprise and emerge from the crisis as a healthy, global aerospace leader, adjusting to the overwhelming challenges of our customers,’ he added.
‘To confront that reality, we must now adopt more far-reaching measures. Our management team and our Board of Directors are fully committed to limiting the social impact of this adaptation. We thank our governmental partners as they help us preserve our expertise and know-how as much as possible and have played an important role in limiting the social impact of this crisis in our industry. The Airbus teams and their skills and competencies will enable us to pursue our ambition to pioneer a sustainable future for aerospace.’
Airbus plans to further adapt to #COVID19 environment https://t.co/ZDWinWg8Xy pic.twitter.com/QEtNy6IzS4
— Airbus PRESS (@AirbusPRESS) June 30, 2020
Image credit: Twitter/ @Airbus
