civil aircraft . for its parent corporation see airbus group . airbus sas entry of saint martin site blagnac type subsidiary industry aerospace founded 18 december 1970 as airbus industrie 2001 as airbus sas founder roger b teille felix kracht henri ziegler franz josef strauss headquarters blagnac france area served worldwide key people fabrice br gier president and chief executive officer tom williams chief operating officer products commercial airliners list number of employees 72 816 2015 parent airbus group subsidiaries airbus corporate jets airbus operations s.a.s. airbus prosky stelia aerospace website www.airbus.com airbus sas rb s french bys listen german b s spanish eir us is a division of the multinational airbus group se that manufactures civil aircraft . it is based in blagnac france a suburb of toulouse 1 2 with production and manufacturing facilities mainly in france germany spain china united kingdom and the united states . the company employs 72 816 . 3 airbus began as a consortium of aerospace manufacturers airbus industrie . consolidation of european defence and aerospace companies in 1999 and 2000 allowed the establishment of a simplified joint stock company in 2001 owned by the european aeronautic defence and space company eads 80 % and bae systems 20 % . after a protracted sales process bae sold its shareholding to eads on 13 october 2006 . 4 airbus has sixteen key sites in four countries france germany spain and the united kingdom . final assembly production is based at toulouse france ; hamburg germany ; seville spain tianjin china and mobile alabama . 5 airbus has subsidiaries in the united states japan and india . the company produces and markets the first commercially viable digital fly by wire airliner the airbus a320 6 7 and the world s largest passenger airliner the a380 . the 10 000th aircraft an a350 was delivered to singapore airlines on 14 october 2016 ; the global airbus fleet having performed more than 110 million flights over 215 billion kilometres carrying 12 billion passengers . 8 contents 1 history 1.1 origins 1.2 formation of airbus industrie 1.3 development of the airbus a300 1.4 transition to airbus sas 1.5 development of the a380 1.6 expansion and sale of bae stake 1.7 2007 restructuring 1.8 2011 a320neo record orders 2 corporate affairs 3 civilian products 3.1 consumer products 4 military products 5 new supersonic passenger plane 6 orders and deliveries 7 competition with boeing 7.1 subsidy conflicts 8 international manufacturing presence 9 2016 deal with iran 10 environmental record 10.1 biofuel 11 export credits 12 airbus aircraft numbering system 12.1 engine codes 13 see also 14 references 15 bibliography 16 external links history edit origins edit airbus industrie began as a consortium of european aviation firms formed to compete with american companies such as boeing mcdonnell douglas and lockheed . 9 while many european aircraft were innovative even the most successful had small production runs . 10 in 1991 jean pierson then ceo and managing director of airbus industrie described a number of factors which explained the dominant position of american aircraft manufacturers the land mass of the united states made air transport the favoured mode of travel ; a 1942 anglo american agreement entrusted transport aircraft production to the us ; and world war ii had left america with a profitable vigorous powerful and structured aeronautical industry . 10 for the purpose of strengthening european co operation in the field of aviation technology and thereby promoting economic and technological progress in europe to take appropriate measures for the joint development and production of an airbus . airbus mission statement 11 in the mid 1960s tentative negotiations commenced regarding a european collaborative approach . individual aircraft companies had already envisioned such a requirement ; in 1959 hawker siddeley had advertised an airbus version of the armstrong whitworth aw .660 argosy 12 which would be able to lift as many as 126 passengers on ultra short routes at a direct operating cost of 2d . per seat mile . 13 however european aircraft manufacturers were aware of the risks of such a development and began to accept along with their governments that collaboration was required to develop such an aircraft and to compete with the more powerful us manufacturers . at the 1965 paris air show major european airlines informally discussed their requirements for a new airbus capable of transporting 100 or more passengers over short to medium distances at a low cost . 11 the same year hawker siddeley at the urging of the uk government teamed with breguet and nord to study airbus designs . the hawker siddeley breguet nord group s hbn 100 became the basis for the continuation of the project . by 1966 the partners were sud aviation later a rospatiale france arbeitsgemeinschaft airbus later deutsche airbus west germany and hawker siddeley uk . 11 a request for funding was made to the three governments in october 1966 . 11 on 25 july 1967 the three governments agreed to proceed with the proposal . in the two years following this agreement both the british and french governments expressed doubts about the project . the mou had stated that 75 orders must be achieved by 31 july 1968 . the french government threatened to withdraw from the project due to the concern over funding development of the airbus a300 concorde and the dassault mercure concurrently but was persuaded otherwise . 14 with concerns at proposal of the a300b proposal in december 1968 and fearing it would not recoup its investment due to lack of sales the british government withdrew on 10 april 1969 . 11 15 west germany took this opportunity to increase its share of the project to 50 % . 14 given the participation by hawker siddeley up to that point france and west germany were reluctant to take over its wing design . thus the british company was allowed to continue as a privileged subcontractor . 10 hawker siddeley invested gb 35 million in tooling and requiring more capital received a gb 35 million loan from the west german government . 14 formation of airbus industrie edit airbus a300 the first aircraft launched by airbus airbus industrie was formally established as a groupement d int r t conomique economic interest group or gie on 18 december 1970 . 14 it had been formed by a government initiative between france west germany and the uk that originated in 1967 . its initial shareholders were the french company a rospatiale and the west german company deutsche airbus each owning a 50 % share . the name airbus was taken from a non proprietary term used by the airline industry in the 1960s to refer to a commercial aircraft of a certain size and range for this term was acceptable to the french linguistically . a rospatiale and deutsche airbus each took a 36.5 % share of production work hawker siddeley 20 % and the dutch company fokker vfw 7 % . 11 each company would deliver its sections as fully equipped ready to fly items . in october 1971 the spanish company casa acquired a 4.2 % share of airbus industrie with a rospatiale and deutsche airbus reducing their stakes to 47.9 % . 11 in january 1979 british aerospace which had absorbed hawker siddeley in 1977 acquired a 20 % share of airbus industrie . 16 the majority shareholders reduced their shares to 37.9 % while casa retained its 4.2 % . 17 development of the airbus a300 edit main article airbus a300 eastern air lines was airbus s first customer in the american market ordering the airbus a300 b4 the airbus a300 was to be the first aircraft to be developed manufactured and marketed by airbus . by early 1967 the a300 label began to be applied to a proposed 320 seat twin engined airliner . 11 following the 1967 tri government agreement roger b teille was appointed technical director of the a300 development project . 18 b teille developed a division of labour which would be the basis of airbus production for years to come france would manufacture the cockpit flight control and the lower centre section of the fuselage ; hawker siddeley whose trident technology had impressed him was to manufacture the wings ; 19 west germany should make the forward and rear fuselage sections as well as the upper centre section ; the dutch would make the flaps and spoilers ; finally spain yet to become a full partner would make the horizontal tailplane . 18 on 26 september 1967 the west german french and british governments signed a memorandum of understanding in london which allowed continued development studies . this also confirmed sud aviation as the lead company that france and the uk would each have a 37.5 % work share with west germany taking 25 % and that rolls royce would manufacture the engines . 10 18 in the face of lukewarm support from airlines for a 300 seat airbus a300 the partners submitted the a250 proposal later becoming the a300b a 250 seat airliner powered by pre existing engines . 11 this dramatically reduced development costs as the rolls royce rb207 to be used in the a300 represented a large proportion of the costs . the rb207 had also suffered difficulties and delays since rolls royce was concentrating its efforts on the development of another jet engine the rb211 for the lockheed l 1011 14 and rolls royce entering into administration due to bankruptcy in 1971 . 20 21 the a300b was smaller but lighter and more economical than its three engined american rivals . 22 23 we showed the world we were not sitting on a nine day wonder and that we wanted to realise a family of planes we won over customers we wouldn t otherwise have won ... now we had two planes that had a great deal in common as far as systems and cockpits were concerned . jean roeder chief engineer of deutsche airbus speaking of the a310 17 in 1972 the a300 made its maiden flight ; its first production model the a300b2 entered service in 1974 . 24 however the launch of the a300 was largely overshadowed by the similarly timed supersonic aircraft concorde . 25 initially the success of the consortium was poor 26 but orders for the aircraft picked up 27 28 due in part to the marketing skills used by airbus ceo bernard lathi re targeting airlines in america and asia . 29 by 1979 the consortium had 256 orders for a300 25 and airbus had launched a more advanced aircraft the a310 in the previous year . 17 it was the launch of the a320 in 1987 that guaranteed the status of airbus as a major player in the aircraft market 30 the aircraft had over 400 orders before it first flew compared to 15 for the a300 in 1972 . transition to airbus sas edit airbus a340 introduced in 1993 airbus a330 introduced in 1994 the retention of production and engineering assets by the partner companies in effect made airbus industrie a sales and marketing company . 31 this arrangement led to inefficiencies due to the inherent conflicts of interest that the four partner companies faced ; they were both gie shareholders of and subcontractors to the consortium . the companies collaborated on development of the airbus range but guarded the financial details of their own production activities and sought to maximise the transfer prices of their sub assemblies . 32 it was becoming clear that airbus was no longer a temporary collaboration to produce a single plane as per its original mission statement it had become a long term brand for the development of further aircraft . by the late 1980s work had begun on a pair of new medium sized aircraft the biggest to be produced at this point under the airbus name the airbus a330 and the airbus a340 . 33 34 in