Strong market demand for Airbus aircraft products

Despite Airbus' 2024 revenue decline, there is still strong market demand for its products, the report said.

Airbus aims to produce 820 planes in 2025 as the world's largest aircraft manufacturer tries to overcome problems in its supply chain.

The European aerospace company said deliveries this year would rise 7% from the 766 aircraft produced last year, as it reported an 8% fall in 2024 revenue (excluding other costs) to €5.4bn (about £4.7bn).

Guillaume Faury, Airbus chief executive, described it as “a challenging year” but said the “strong order intake” confirmed that “ there is solid market demand for our products and services ”.

While Airbus is still on track to ramp up production of its best-selling aircraft, production of other models has also been disrupted by supply chain challenges. Illustration photo

Production disrupted by impact in supply chain

The ramp-up of commercial aircraft production has been hampered by Airbus’s supply chain struggling to recover from disruptions and employee retirements during the Covid-19 pandemic, preventing it from capitalizing on its advantage over US rival Boeing, which has left Airbus as the world’s leading aircraft maker unchallenged by years of safety crises, including the mid-air loss of a door in 2024.

While Airbus is still on track to ramp up production of its best-selling single-aisle A320, it said production of its larger twin-aisle models, the A350 and the smaller A220, has been disrupted by specific supply chain challenges, particularly with aerospace components maker Spirit AeroSystems. Spirit is being spun off as part of a takeover by Boeing, with Airbus taking over production of the A220's wings in Belfast, England.

Airbus has delayed production of a new freighter version of its A350 by a year, and reported a £121m cost due to further delays to its troubled military transport aircraft, the A400M.