European aerospace firm EADS was under pressure today to find a quick fix to a new management crisis at Airbus which threatened to break a fragile industrial truce between France and Germany.
EADS declined comment on a report that its co-chief executive Louis Gallois would run the planemaker unit directly, taking over from newly appointed Airbus chief Christian Streiff, who has placed his job on the line over reforms needed to catch up with Boeing.
Shares in EADS were 0.9 per cent lower at 20.24 euros early this morning, after falling around 10 per cent last week when the company said the Airbus A380 superjumbo programme was on average two years behind schedule and issued a new profit warning.
In a further blow to the company, Airbus reported that it sold just four aircraft in September, a lower number of orders than for any month in 2006 or 2005.
Airbus said today its total new orders this year rose to 226 as at the end of September, highlighting a growing gap with US-based rival Boeing, which has overtaken Airbus in net new orders this year with 723 planes added to its backlog by October 3rd.
Appointed in July to resolve industrial delays to the A380, Mr Streiff has drawn political criticism, especially in Germany, over his plans for a radical shake-up of Airbus factories.