Airbus Names New Commercial Jet CEO, Reaffirms Delivery Goal

(Bloomberg) — Airbus SE will replace the head of its commercial aircraft business and stick with a goal to deliver about 770 aircraft this year, underscoring the planemaker’s focus on ironing out supply-chain glitches that have hampered production plans.

Lars Wagner, the chief executive officer of engine parts maker MTU Aero Engines AG, will lead the commercial unit when he joins the planemaker around the beginning of 2026. He’ll replace Christian Scherer, a 40-year Airbus veteran.

Airbus also said its board plans to propose renewing CEO Guillaume Faury’s mandate as the company’s top executive.

In reaffirming its full-year delivery plans amid leadership change, Airbus is signaling confidence in the path forward after persistent supply-chain turmoil. Several analysts had expected the company to trim the 2024 goal after the planemaker delivered 497 commercial jets through the first nine months of the year.

“We have quite a difficult end of the year ahead of us,” Faury said in a Bloomberg TV interview.

Airbus’ US-traded shares rose 3.5% on Wednesday.

The announcements came as Airbus detailed third-quarter financial results. Adjusted earnings before interest and taxes were €1.41 billion in the period, according to a stock exchange filing, topping the €1.21 billion average of analyst estimates compiled by Bloomberg.

The world’s largest planemaker has been unable to build aircraft fast enough to meet demand as airlines upgrade their fleets with more fuel-efficient jets. Its suppliers have struggled to ramp production in the aftermath of the pandemic, forcing Airbus to repeatedly push back its lofty target of producing 75 A320 planes a month, which it now expects to do in 2027.

Speaking on a separate call with reporters, Faury said the decision to replace Scherer, 62, was guided by succession planning, dismissing suggestions that the company’s struggle ramping up production played a role. He said that Scherer is closer to retirement age than Wagner.

“It is absolutely not reflecting any indication of Christian not doing the job,” Faury said.

Wagner’s arrival will bring an executive with first-hand experience managing a key part of Airbus’ supply chain. MTU is a partner on the geared turbofan jet engine made by RTX Corp.’s Pratt & Whitney unit. The turbine is one of two options available on the A320neo jetliner family, Airbus’ top-selling model.

Engine supplies from RTX and rival CFM International Inc. continue to limit output of the A320neo family and are expected to be scarce for months, Faury told reporters on Wednesday.

Supplies from CFM should improve in the second half of 2025, Faury told Bloomberg TV. 

Plans to boost production of the A350 widebody jet next year will be “difficult,” Faury said, because of parts made by Spirit AeroSystems Holdings Inc. as well as interiors and seats that are slowing its assembly lines.

Airbus reiterated that it expects adjusted earnings before interest and tax of €5.5 billion this year. Free cash flow before customer financing will come in at about €3.5 billion.

Third-quarter revenue rose 5.4% to €15.7 billion. 

–With assistance from Romaine Bostick and Scarlet Fu.

(Updates with shares, CEO comment from the fifth paragraph. An earlier version corrected the spelling of Airbus CEO’s name.)

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