Julian Moxon/PARIS
AEROSPATIALE president Louis Gallois has warned that the state-owned French aerospace group will have to lose up to 3,000 jobs over the next two years. Following the lead set by Daimler-Benz Aerospace (DASA) in Germany, he claims that the low value of the US dollar is "...killing the European aviation industry".
Some analysts believe that Aerospatiale's problems may be more structural, however, pointing to the group's underlying failure to re-organise itself to become more competitive against non-state-owned manufacturers such as British Aerospace.
Aerospatiale's unions have made it clear that they will strike if the job cuts go ahead, a move which one industry manager says would be "suicidal".
Most of the job losses, which represent around 10% of the group workforce, will come in the aircraft and missiles divisions. The civil-aircraft business, which is responsible for France's Airbus share, has suffered badly from the low dollar- exchange rate, while defence budget reductions have eaten into the missiles business. The space division, which has been winning new business, is unlikely to be affected.
The Franco-German Eurocopter group, in which Aerospatiale has a 70% stake, will also lose up to 800 jobs. Eurocopter chairman Jean-Francois Bigay has launched a drive for savings of Fr750 million ($152 million) over the next two years.
Bigay says that the savings are to come from squeezing down supplier prices, cutting staff in France and reductions already envisaged by DASA in German under its Dolores (dollar-low rescue) plan.
Work allocation between the German and French plants will also be re-assessed.
Source: Flight International