Home Business Business News
Airbus US deal decision in balance
Jun 20 2008 by Tony McDonough, Liverpool Daily Post
AIRBUS workers on Deeside are waiting to hear if they will be stripped of a multi-billion pound order for wings for airborne refuelling tankers for the US Air Force.
Less than four months after the company won an £18bn order from the Pentagon for the 179 military aircraft, the whole deal has been thrown into doubt.
Wings for the refuelling aircraft were expected to be built at Airbus’s Broughton plant, near Chester, which employs more than 7,000 staff, before being shipped to Alabama for final assembly of the tanker jets in Mobile. Bosses at Broughton had said the deal would secure existing jobs and could create additional ones.
But now the Government Accountability Office (GAO), a US government agency, has upheld Boeing's protest against the awarding of the air tanker deal to Airbus parent group EADS and Northrop Grumman saying the Air Force made a “number of errors” that could have swung the outcome of the competition.
The GAO's ruling is not binding, but it puts pressure on the Air Force to put the process out to tender again.
Hot Deals
Copyright and Trade Mark Notice © 2009 owned by or licensed to Trinity Mirror North West & North Wales Limited. Liverpool Daily Post™ is a trade mark of Trinity Mirror North West & North Wales Limited. Please read our Terms and Conditions and Privacy Statement before using this site.
The Liverpool Daily Post, the best source for Liverpool FC, Everton FC and Liverpool news. Your Liverpool Daily Post, great local images, videos and your local stories.