Emirates Blasts Airbus for Confused Strategy on Wide-Body Jets
- Clark queries value of enlarging European company's new A350
- Gulf carrier says it would like upgraded A380 from 2021
An Emirates Airbus A380.
Photographer: Ishara S. Kodikara/AFP via Getty ImagesThis article is for subscribers only.
Emirates President Tim Clark faulted Airbus Group SE for lacking a coherent strategy on its biggest airliners, saying the planemaker should focus on an upgrade of its A380 superjumbo rather than spend resources on yet another variant of its new A350 twin-engine model.
Airbus’s thinking has become increasingly hard to read and talk of further extending the stretched A350-1000 makes little sense, Clark said Thursday at the ITB travel fair in Berlin, adding that he’s not sure the manufacturer could afford to fund that project alongside the upgraded A380 he’s keen to buy.