Airbus CEO warns on jobs after air travel market worsens

Airbus CEO Guillaume Faury stepped up his warning on forced job cuts at the European planemaker as a sharper-than-expected decline in travel leads carriers to push back deliveries of new jets. “The situation has worsened” coming out of the summer high season, he said Tuesday. “Airlines are in a more difficult situation after the holidays than what we were hoping.” The industrial giant, whose cost-cutting plans call for the elimination of 15,000 jobs, will have to “adapt to the new environment,” he added, in particular on the employment front. The shares dropped as much as 2.7%. “It will be very difficult to stick with voluntary departures,” Faury said, reiterating that the company “is potentially at risk” if it doesn’t take the right steps. He pointed to a 40% decline in the jet maker’s production and deliveries. France is braced to absorb about one-third of the planned cuts and Faury on Tuesday said talks with unions are aimed at using tools like part-time employment and state support of research and development to avoid forcing people to leave the company. “Airlines aren’t canceling their orders but they aren’t honoring deliveries,” Faury said. “The delays on deliveries are very strong” because carriers don’t have the means to take ownership of the planes after passengers and revenue dried up. Airbus’s 40% reduction in output is holding but “I’m extremely cautious about how the crisis is developing and what is coming next with Covid,” he said.<br/>