Airbus is in the process of opening it's first manufacturing facility in the United States. The company claims the factory will be the most efficient in the world and will have it focus on building the largest versions of its single-aisle aircraft, the A320 and the A321 (which can hold up to 240 passengers).
The factory is in Mobile, Alabama, on 116 acres. It will have the capacity to produce eight A320 and A321 planes a month, although the company has no immediate plants to push US production to that level, planning on crafting about a plane a week in the immediate future.
The Airbus factory is obviously in direct competition with its American counterpart, Boeing, which produces up to 42 of its 737 jets a month at a factory in Renton, Washington (and has plans to increase production to 52 a month by 2018). Between all of its facilities, Airbus will be producing about 50 of the A320 family planes a month by 2017. Currently there is a huge back order of single aisle aircraft.
The U.S. presence gives Airbus a strong hand when negotiating with U.S. airlines. The Mobile plant will supply North American airlines, with the first two planes going to JetBlue and American Airlines in 2016.
More on this story from Reuters at this link.
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