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I pulled the prices below from the websites of Boeing and airbus. It looks as if the equivalent Boeing model is always cheaper than it's Airbus counterpart (or am I matching them up wrong).
Lease Terms, Training credits, Lifetime costs, maintenance costs/time, Current fleet (training, inventory, crewing, scheduling ... ) , Access to Replacement parts depot, Location of Heavy overhaul, Time in Overhaul. Tax Credits, Politics, "foreign aid" (Buying terms that factor in on costs)
Another factor is government subsidies in the form of government-backed loan guarantees for the purchase of aircraft. Europe offers these to customers of Airbus and the US offers these via the Import-Export Bank to customers of Boeing. I'm not an expert and don't know exactly what the comparative advantage is, but it does play a part.
The break-even for the A380 was initially supposed to be reached by selling 270 units, but due to the delays and the falling exchange rate of the US dollar, it increased to 420 units. Negotiated discounts made the actual prices much lower, and industry experts questioned whether the A380 project would ever pay for itself.
So far only 11 airlines are operating 138 the jets, with half of them being owned by Emirates and Singapore airlines. Of these airlines Emirates has another 90 on order, and the other 10 airlines have 27 unfilled orders.
---- Middle East
50 EMIRATES UNITED ARAB EMIRATES
---- Asia
19 SINGAPORE AIRLINES SINGAPORE
10 KOREAN AIR KOREA, REPUBLIC OF
6 MALAYSIA AIRLINES MALAYSIA
6 THAI AIRWAYS INTERNATIONAL THAILAND
5 CHINA SOUTHERN AIRLINES COMPANY CHINA
2 ASIANA AIRLINES KOREA, REPUBLIC OF
---- Europe
12 LUFTHANSA GERMANY
10 AIR FRANCE FRANCE
6 BRITISH AIRWAYS UNITED KINGDOM
---- Oceana
12 QANTAS AIRWAYS AUSTRALIA
Another 63 jets have been ordered by the following airlines or companies
VIRGIN ATLANTIC UNITED KINGDOM
TRANSAERO AIRLINES RUSSIAN FEDERATION
AIR AUSTRAL FRANCE
ETIHAD AIRWAYS UNITED ARAB EMIRATES
QATAR AIRWAYS QATAR
AMEDEO IRELAND (leasing company)
UNDISCLOSED 10
private 1
When AirBus announced the A380 I saw a very limited market for it.
Hub to Hub on long haul flights. Limited number of airports that would spend the millions to upgrade runways for it weight, taxi way for its wing span, Multiple Jetways 4? ATC ground ops issue keeping other planes away from it as it taxi's
Remember the AirFrance A380 that spun the Commuter jet in a circle when the wing of the A380 caught the rear stabilizer at JFK
Customs / Immigration to be able to handle the surge of the passenger load.
B787 was getting big booking going to many cities with the "Right" size passenger loads, with 1 crew. The A380 with its long distance seem to be doubled crewed.
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