Ten Widebodys Per Month To Continue Coming Off The Company's Assembly Line

Airbus plans to continue to produce 10 of its A330 twin-aisle airplanes per month, according to COO John Leahy.

The announcement came as the planemaker handed over the 1000th A330 to Cathay Pacific Airways last week. Leahy said that Airbus has several "major" ongoing sales campaigns that will keep the production level steady.

Bloomberg reports that, during a post-delivery news conference, Leahy said "We'll be in production until the next decade" based on interest from "quite a few customers" that include airlines and leasing companies. One of those, Cebu Air, is configuring the plane with 436 seats, which is the highest passenger density of any Airbus A330 customer.

Leahy said that part of the demand for the A330 can be attributed to delays in deliveries of Boeing's Dreamliner. He said there is a 246-unit backlog for the A330, enough for two years of production. He said airlines are considering the airplane as a replacement for older B777-200s, that it competes with the -8 and -9 models of the Dreamliner, and it can optionally be configured as a freighter as well as a military tanker.

Leahy also said that the company is developing a regional variant of the A330, which should be available later this year.

(A330 image from file)

FMI: www.airbus.com