Airbus said Tuesday it needs to cut 15,000 jobs — or 17% of its commercial jet workforce — within the next year in response to the COVID-19 crisis that has devastated the airline business.
The company said after an “in-depth analysis of customer demand,” it does not expect air traffic to recover to pre-pandemic levels before 2023, and potentially as late as 2025.
A worker completes tasks on a plane’s wings at the Airbus plant in Broughton, Wales
Because commercial jet revenue is now 40% below pre-pandemic levels, the job cuts would be much worse without support Airbus is receiving from European governments.
Aside from the prospective 15,000 job cuts, many Airbus employees are now working part-time, with their respective governments paying them unemployment benefits for the hours not worked, through September and in some cases beyond.
The job losses will be distributed so about 5,100 will be cut in Germany, 5,000 in France, 1,700 in the U.K., 900 in Spain and 1,300 elsewhere, mainly in China, the United States and Canada.
People celebrate near an Airbus A330neo aircraft after its maiden flight event in Colomiers near Toulouse, France
These new cuts because of the pandemic come on top of previously announced unrelated losses of 2,600 jobs in the Defense and Space division and another 900 jobs from the restructuring of an Airbus subsidiary in Germany that produces commercial jet parts.