The Airbus A380's service entry last year with Singapore Airlines brought an unprecedented level of style and sophistication to the airliner cabin. But the complexity of these brand-defining devices does not make life easy for the customers, the aircraft manufacturers and their suppliers, as they can result in an extensive number of options, very long lead times and sometimes questionable service readiness.
Boeing has looked to address this as part of the cabin rethink it undertook with the development of the 787, reducing the number of options available to customers as part of the drive to reduce lead times for buyer furnished equipment (BFE). Not to be outdone, Airbus has revamped its cabin supplier scheme for the A350 XWB along the lines of the way a powerplant choice is offered. Customers will be able to choose from a catalogue of suppliers that are contracted with Airbus to meet certain technical and performance specifications, and then negotiate the price directly with the supplier. The result is a new category of cabin supply line, which will not only significantly reduce lead time compared with the airframer's current programmes, but should also ensure better integration of systems and high reliability from introduction.
François Caudron, vice-president A350 customer & business development at Airbus, says there were four drivers behind the decision to revamp the cabin customisation process for the A350: the lessons learned from A330/A340 and A380 the fact that the industry is under huge market pressure on aircraft pricing which requires tighter cost control of the customisation process because Airbus is "the number two" to market behind Boeing and the 787 "there is a very steep ramp-up which has shortened the industrial cycle of the A350 compared with the A330/A340" and the A350 must be adaptable to various markets to enable lessors to place aircraft immediately when returned off lease, or so an airline can operate it on a variety of missions.
"This has led us to design an innovative product offering which is based on the richest specification, on a standard platform for the aircraft and offering customisation for extra differentiation or to meet customers' specific operational requirements," says Caudron. "We are securing the supply chain to give us better service readiness."
The result is a completely new approach to the way the Airbus customisation process offering will work, says Caudron. While the lavatory and galley will be designated supplier furnished equipment (SFE) and therefore similar to existing programmes, "the novelty comes with the in-flight entertainment and the seats", he says.
These items are traditionally designated BFE - which means that the customer sources it directly from a list of approved suppliers and it is installed by the airframer - but for the A350 come under a new category: "Airbus contracted supplier" (ACS).
Caudron explains that ACS equipment is "neither a BFE or SFE" and results from the decision to implement the same policy for the cabin as for the other systems on the A350, where suppliers are selected much further upstream in the programme to enable them to participate in the joint definition phase.
"This will enable us to work with suppliers to define the content of the A350 catalogue offering," says Caudron. "The benefit is that because we've put a lot more upstream effort in with suppliers, we clear all the interfaces and prepare installation of equipment.
"This means that when a customer picks equipment from the catalogue they will know that Airbus has carried out all the necessary validation and that the equipment will be delivered on time to the production line."
Current Airbus programmes use a catalogue system for the selection of equipment, but this is in reality just a list of "qualified BFE suppliers and equipment, so the customer knows who he can go and negotiate with", says Caudron.
"In the past, through a BFE scheme, our qualification process for suppliers was much lighter, and contractually the responsibility for getting the equipment right and on time, etc, lay with the customer."
Under the BFE scheme there have been issues with the integration of IFE in the seat, and these are the sort of issues that will be tackled upstream, says Caudron. "Now we agree with suppliers standardised interfaces and connectors and will agree a new IFE offering based on a standardised Arinc principle."
Customers will have an eight-month lead time for the A350's cabin on the catalogue offering, which is a 30% reduction compared with the A330/A340.
The ACS scheme will see suppliers contracted to ensure that all the pre-requisites are agreed, effectively making them a programme partner, rather than just a supplier. The pre-requisites include the technical aspects of equipment, the quality, the programme management, the supply chain, need for innovation and the product support, says Caudron.
Airbus has begun the bid process for its SFE and ACS selection and "we've had very positive feedback, both from suppliers and customers", says Caudron. He adds that the aim is to complete the bidding process for the cabin suppliers by the end of the second quarter. He expects to sign up "a handful" of cabin suppliers: "There's no target number - it's all down to the negotiations that are under way."
Flexibility
Despite the closer ties between Airbus and its ACS suppliers, Caudron says that the new scheme retains the flexibility of the old BFE arrangement as "the customers will be the ones negotiating the commercial conditions with the supplier". He adds that the ACS suppliers will still be in "fierce competition", thus ensuring their offerings are still innovative.
As part of efforts to simplify the cabin selection process, the 787's catalogue contains multiple seat types from just six economy seat manufacturers for which Boeing provides ratings for various measures such as comfort, and size. While it has a catalogue offering for the premium cabin seats, it also enables customers to incorporate their brand innovations.
Caudron says while Airbus will have a catalogue offering for seats for all classes under the ACS scheme it will "accept to install BFE premium class seats so that airlines can retain the ability to customise their cabin product".
Although the lavatory and galley will retain their traditional SFE category, there will be some policy changes here too, says Caudron. Lavatories have traditionally been single-source and Airbus is moving to a single-source supply for the galley too, but will keep customer flexibility by adopting a modular concept.
"We are going to single sourcing for the galley structure so that there are standard aircraft interfaces, but the customers will have a very wide selection of galley inserts available to enable them to customise their unit to their specific requirement," says Caudron.
He says that a driver for the single-source SFE policy for lavatories and galley is the desire to retain the key design features of Airbus's "Chrysalis" concept cabin being used to help define the XWB's interior. Caudron identifies key concepts that will make production as "the 'continuous line' design theme that runs along the overhead bins, and the lack of interference that results from the better integration of the different monuments".
Boeing aims to cut the lead time required for 787 customers to define their cabin specifications to six months with help from its "Dreamliner Gallery" which opened at its Everett plant last year. Caudron says that while Boeing "trumpets" this customisation innovation, "what it has forgot to mention is that once a 787 customer has made its selections, they've still got to contract with all their suppliers".
While the construction of an A350 mock-up is "under study", Caudron says that there are "other 'tools' being investigated" by Airbus to help customers spec their cabins.
Source: Flight International
