Industry Airbus reports Q1 2020 results

Airbus has officially reported the financial results for the First Quarter of this year.

Airbus Chief Executive Officer Guillaume Faury commented: “We saw a solid start to the year both commercially and industrially, but we are quickly seeing the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic coming through in the numbers.”

The Frenchman claimed that the industry is in the midst of the gravest crisis the aerospace industry has ever seen. He added: "We’re implementing a number of measures to ensure the future of Airbus. We kicked off early by bolstering available liquidity to support financial flexibility. We’re adapting commercial aircraft production rates in line with customer demand and concentrating on cash containment and our longer-term cost structure to ensure we can return to normal operations once the situation improves."

As of March 31, the order backlog comprised 7,650 commercial aircraft, with 290 of them being ordered in Q1 2020. Subsidiary company Airbus Helicopters booked orders for 54 helicopters and the Airbus Defence and Space order intake measured €1.7 billion.

However due to the Coronavirus, consolidated revenues decreased to € 10.6 billion (Q1 2019: €12.5 billion). This number reflects the difficult market environment the industry and the company is in right now.

Airbus delivered 40 less deliveries than a year earlier. A total of 122 commercial aircraft were delivered comprising 8 A220s, 96 A320 Family, 4 A330s and 14 A350s. The helicopter division delivered 47 rotorcraft. 60 already built aircraft were not delivered due to the COVID-19 restrictions.

In total, the report shows a loss of around €480 million, as nearly every country is continuing to enforce the global air travel restrictions. The need for new aircraft is currently not high, as many airlines have to ground their fleets.

"At all times, the health and safety of Airbus’ employees is our top priority. Now we need to work as an industry to restore passenger confidence in air travel as we learn to coexist with this pandemic. We’re focused on the resilience of our company to ensure business continuity," Faury concluded.