Word: airbuses
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...American to beat the Yanks at their own game, but Leahy downplays any national typecasting. The most significant thing about the sales staff, he says, is not his American background but the team approach that he has fostered. "There are no divas here. This is not about me or [Airbus CEO] Noel Forgeard selling planes over a 2 1/2-hour lunch. We have built a team from the ground up. Salesmen, contract specialists, finance specialists, airline analysts and pilots all work together...
Leahy's experience in the business is hands-on. Armed with an M.B.A. from Syracuse University, he got a commercial pilot's license, then worked as a Piper Aircraft salesman for seven years before joining Airbus Industrie North America in 1985. ("Boeing seemed like a superpower," he says.) After rapidly working his way up through the sales and marketing departments, Leahy was named president of the U.S. subsidiary in 1994. During his American stint, Leahy saw the annual number of Airbus sales to North American carriers rise from 40 to 329. In 1996 he moved to the Toulouse headquarters with...
...Airbus executive who has worked with Leahy since his arrival calls him "small of stature but hard-driving and aggressive--like Napoleon--with large eyes that can fix the most powerful gaze on you." When he gazed at Airbus, Leahy saw a stuffy organization in need of a shake-up. One of Leahy's American-style innovations, says this official, was the open office. "He literally broke down the walls between the sales guys, the contract guys and the airline analysts, and put them together in regional units. The results speak for themselves." Says another colleague: "Once John sinks...
Leahy would be the last man to discount the value of good salesmanship, but the real issue, he insists, is the quality of Airbus jets. He eagerly awaits the planned A3XX, a double-deck 550-seat mammoth with onboard sleeping areas, lounges, duty-free shops and exercise rooms, which will sell for up to $240 million apiece. "It will be a totally different way of flying," he says. Airbus will put the plane in service by 2005 if it can get the advance orders to justify the $12 billion development cost. So far, only a handful of airlines, mainly...
Then there's Airbus, long ridiculed by Boeing as a massive pork-barrel project for second-rate aircraft manufacturers. Last year the European consortium captured 55% of global-passenger jetliner sales, outflanking Boeing for the first, but probably not the last, time. Competitive prices and superior salesmanship are factors in the success of Airbus, but so is technology. Airbus beat Boeing to the market with computer-laden "fly-by-wire" technology, which, it says, enhances safety while lowering costs. The flying experience is so similar from model to model that Airbus-equipped airlines save millions of dollars in training costs...