Aircraft

Airbus has conceded that the new 747-8 family could pose a threat to the A380 in the cargo market, but does not think it will have to make any design changes to see off the competition.

“The new 747-8 Freighter might be a competitor as cargo doesn’t care about being carried in a 30-year-old aircraft,” says Airbus president and chief executive Gustav Humbert.

But Boeing Commercial Air­planes’ vice-president of marketing Randy Baseler says the 140t payload capability and better structural efficiency of the lighter 747-8 Freighter make it superior to the 152t-payload A380-800F, despite the latter’s greater volume because, unlike the Airbus, the 747-8F is designed for “real-world cargo densities”.

Baseler points to the success of the new 747 in securing orders from general freight operators Cargolux and Nippon Cargo Airlines (NCA), both of which were involved in the A380F’s definition, but are also major 747-400F operators. Although the A380F has been sold to express package carriers FedEx Express and UPS, which are more focused on volume than payload, it has yet to be ordered by a major general freight airline. “I think you’ll see Airbus look at ways of improving the A380F to make it more competitive in that sector of the cargo market,” Baseler adds.

But Airbus chief operating officer and A380 programme chief Charles Champion says there are no plans to revise the freighter’s specification, and he thinks other factors were responsible for the loss of the Cargolux and NCA deals. “The situation is similar to the 1980s when we were trying to convince all the 737 operators to move over to the all-new A320.”

Meanwhile, Humbert says the arrival of the 450-seat 747-8 passenger aircraft is unlikely to prompt Airbus to launch a shrink of the 550-seat A380-800. “More customers are asking for a stretch rather than a shrink,” he adds.