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Airbus A380, Once the Future of Aviation, May Cease Production

nytimes.com

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Re: Airbus A380, Once the Future of Aviation, May Cease Production

#91

Post by InTheArena »

Havoc wrote: post #73
double0jimb0 wrote: post #15

Interning at Boeing in 2005, when the Dreamliner was still 2-3 years away from production, I asked a BD manager if Boeing was worried about A380 (the burning question at the time was "Who is going to win, A380/Airbus or Dreamliner/Boeing"). Without pause, he said "Not worried at all, A380 serves the hub and spoke model, which is dying. People hate layovers, they want more direct flights." Not a hard insight to grasp,…

As long as hub & spoke works out cheaper (which it will thanks to centralisation & economies of scale) it'll have a place in the budget market

As far as I am aware, there are no A380s in the charter market yet (which is a lot of budget market) and very very few in the discount carrier world (EasyJet, RyanAir, Sprit, Norwegian, Iceland Air, etc). The charter carriers and discount carriers typically don't have the traffic to sustain these flights, and really don't have first or business class traffic to sustain the flight.

The a380 was made for large traffic to and from Asian cities. If there is going to be a savior for the program, that's where it will come from.

There are rumors that Airbus has approached China to talk about taking over a large portion of the project, in exchange for Chinese orders. That's something to keep a eye on.

Re: Airbus A380, Once the Future of Aviation, May Cease Production

#92

Post by InTheArena »

_0nac wrote: post #90
InTheArena wrote: post #85

There are a lot of great books on the founding, planning, engineering and delivering the A380. All of them come to one painful conclusion - the A380 was driven more by politics and enabled by launch aid, rather then by real market need. Airbus has seen the effect of the Arbus 300, Boeing 767 and Boeing 757 in the transatlantic market and knew that large twins capable of going trans-pacific (777 and 787) would similar…

Well, it goes both ways: EK, being essentially a monopsony customer, is also in a great place to squeeze more concessions from Airbus. That's why the two sides are currently engaged in a game of chicken, with EK pulling what seemed like a done deal at the last Dubai airshow ("too expensive, lower your price!") and Airbus now making rumbling noises about cancelling production entirely ("price is too low, no plane for…

It does. It's the banking debt problem. When you owe the bank money, you have a problem. When you owe the bank a lot of money, they have a problem.

Re: Airbus A380, Once the Future of Aviation, May Cease Production

#93

Post by InTheArena »

hinkley wrote: post #87
double0jimb0 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Passengers are cost AND travel-time/hassle sensitive. It appears Airbus didn't place enough value into the "travel-time/hassle" part. More detail: the Dreamliner is 20% more efficient than previous generation planes. This allowed airlines to "break" the major hubs into many quicker/easier direct flights at a price that passengers are willing to pay. Boeing bet increasing value in this manner was superior than Airbus'…

The Dreamliner can also fly about 2x as many miles between servicing (due to more careful logging of wear and tear), which means not only lower costs but also fewer logistical problems about getting the plane back to a maintenance facility before the FAA is breathing down your neck for noncompliance.

And in general, Twins are just lower maintenance.

Re: Airbus A380, Once the Future of Aviation, May Cease Production

#94

Post by ghaff »

srinivasan wrote: post #55
deanCommie wrote: post #33

Can someone with a better understanding of economics than me explain something: How is the "point to point" (direct short flights via Ryanair and the like) beating "hub and spoke"(hubs like London and Frankfurt)? I don't mean for convenience - obviously it's nicer to not have layovers. But I mean economically. In the last 10 years, fuel prices have only gone up, as has environmental awareness, and the A380 is surely…

The A380's engines were developed in the early 2000's. Newer twin-engine planes (B737-MAX, A320neo, A330neo, A350, B787, the upcoming 777-X) have improvements in engine efficiency that have not been ported over to the A380. Airlines operate on wafer-thin margins, so even a percentage point increase in engine efficiency is huge. Granted, the engines themselves are not made by Airbus, but there are integration costs in…

>so even a percentage point increase in engine efficiency is huge.

I interviewed with Boeing out of school many moons ago. To be precise, they offered me a job in response to my mailing them my resume. (In an envelope with a stamp on it; this was a while ago.) But I asked to come out to talk to people.

Did get me the opportunity for a plant tour in Everett (?) if I remember.

Anyway, the engineer who took me out to dinner talked about his project for the past couple of years--some fuel system design of an upcoming design that saved something like a fraction of a percent fuel consumption.

I decided the job didn't sound very appealing.

Re: Airbus A380, Once the Future of Aviation, May Cease Production

#95

Post by rurban »

double0jimb0 wrote: post #15

Interning at Boeing in 2005, when the Dreamliner was still 2-3 years away from production, I asked a BD manager if Boeing was worried about A380 (the burning question at the time was "Who is going to win, A380/Airbus or Dreamliner/Boeing"). Without pause, he said "Not worried at all, A380 serves the hub and spoke model, which is dying. People hate layovers, they want more direct flights." Not a hard insight to grasp,…

But this is also the Dubai business model. Nobody wants to stay there, it's just a convenient stop. With more direct flights Dubai will also die.

Also the EU is strongly behind this project. This is more than just Airbus or Emirates.

So I see no death of the A380, even if the market moved on since.

Re: Airbus A380, Once the Future of Aviation, May Cease Production

#96

Post by lathiat »

garmaine wrote: post #53
jedberg wrote: post #25

What a shame. The best flying experience I've ever had was coach on an A380 from SFO to Frankfurt. It was the only time I arrived feeling awake and fresh. The air felt cleaner, the lighting was great, and it was so smooth . I get why it isn't popular, but it's just too bad. I really liked flying on one.

Try a 787 sometime, you'll have a similar experience. It has everything to do with being a new plane with new technologies (higher air pressure, better lighting, newer seats, etc.). Nothing specific to the A380.

Higher humidity too

Re: Airbus A380, Once the Future of Aviation, May Cease Production

#97

Post by timb07 »

filereaper wrote: post #62
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The 787 replaced the 767 in Boeing's lineup, which in turn was competitor of the 350. The 747 is still incredibly successful for cargo, so the 380 didn't replace it; it is absolutely nuts that AirBus didn't come up with a cargo version of the 380 yet. Next up is the 777, which has higher capacity than the 787/350. However, it is modern enough that it can probably just be upgraded, no new plane is needed.

777 has incredible range, the current 777-LR (worldliner) still flies further than the 787. I think Boeing will upgrade the 777 with better composites and engines, but I doubt 777 will be die anytime soon.

The 777X program is already well advanced, with first flight expected sometime next year.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_777X

Re: Airbus A380, Once the Future of Aviation, May Cease Production

#98

Post by bunderbunder »

ghaff wrote: post #45
double0jimb0 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Passengers are cost AND travel-time/hassle sensitive. It appears Airbus didn't place enough value into the "travel-time/hassle" part. More detail: the Dreamliner is 20% more efficient than previous generation planes. This allowed airlines to "break" the major hubs into many quicker/easier direct flights at a price that passengers are willing to pay. Boeing bet increasing value in this manner was superior than Airbus'…

>Passengers are cost AND travel-time/hassle sensitive. Especially among business travelers. Many business travelers may still shop on price up to a point but they'll tend to do so given that the flights have the same number of stops.

For me, the price needs to be quite a bit lower to justify a layover even on pure financial grounds. I can't back this up with any hard math, but my sense is that time in transit curtails my productivity severely enough that there'd have to be a pretty enormous savings in ticket price to offset the cost of having me spend (say) twice as much time camping out in airport waiting areas and being subject to takeoff/landing laptop embargos.

Re: Airbus A380, Once the Future of Aviation, May Cease Production

#99

Post by InTheArena »

AGoodName wrote: post #41
627467 wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I recently flew a 787 for first time and felt it provided a similar spacious experience to A380. Ceiling space and the large windows seems to help that experience. I'd still hate to see jumbo jets (specially A380) to disappear.

Both the A380 and 787 have higher internal cabin pressures (equivalent of 6000ft). All other planes operate at lower pressure. Anything above 6000ft leads to altitude sickness for those who live at ~0ft. https://www.usatoday.com/story/travel/columnist/hobica/2017/...

This is really good marketing but not really true. A recent study of pressurization found that 747s tend to be operated at lower pressurization the a380s (which are typically run a bit higher then their rates). Almost 1k feet IIRC.

What makes a huge huge difference is humidity. I get off a Denver to narita 787 feeling like it was a long Colorado to California flight, whereas a SFO to Narita flight on a 380 or 747 wrecks me.

Re: Airbus A380, Once the Future of Aviation, May Cease Production

#100

Post by forkandwait »

pkaye wrote: post #20
double0jimb0 wrote: post #15

Interning at Boeing in 2005, when the Dreamliner was still 2-3 years away from production, I asked a BD manager if Boeing was worried about A380 (the burning question at the time was "Who is going to win, A380/Airbus or Dreamliner/Boeing"). Without pause, he said "Not worried at all, A380 serves the hub and spoke model, which is dying. People hate layovers, they want more direct flights." Not a hard insight to grasp,…

It is not a obvious insight to grasp since airlines take a strategy that makes them the most money and passengers are cost sensitive. Wasn't this the driving force behind the hum and spoke model?

If I were building a model, I would estimate my customers average hourly income and figure that is how to calculate break even in a time vs money calculation for a flight. I make 60 an hour (low for regular flyers I bet), a flight change adds 4 hours, so a $240 cost difference for each direct flight is realistic. That might turn into real money if you scale it.
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