Elon Musk has transformed the satellite business with Space-X. Airbus is in the red in this area and is now taking action. This is likely to also affect German locations.
Airbus is struggling with enormous losses in the satellite business and therefore wants to cut up to 2,500 jobs in its defense and space division. The company announced that the dismantling should take place by mid-2026. The Airbus division employs almost 35,000 people in Germany and other European countries.
Which locations are affected will be clarified at the end of the year after discussions with the unions and works councils. Airbus builds satellites primarily in Immenstaad on Lake Constance, in Toulouse, in London and in Munich.
New competition and high losses
While business with military aircraft and cyber security is going well, the space sector had to record depreciation of 989 million euros in the first half of the year, thus ruining the Airbus Group’s interim balance. Last year, Airbus had to set aside half a billion euros. Airbus boss Guillaume Faury announced in July: “We are now tackling the root of the issue.”
The telecommunications and navigation satellite business is under pressure from growing competition and new technologies. Elon Musk’s SpaceX group in the USA is now the largest satellite operator in the world. The market for traditional high-altitude geostationary satellites, on the other hand, has halved in recent years.
“Become faster, leaner and more competitive”
Airbus now wants to give the individual areas of the aerospace division more responsibility and slim down the organizational structure in order to assert itself in the rapidly changing market. “We have to become faster, leaner and more competitive,” says division boss Michael Schoellhorn. The social consequences of job cuts should be limited as much as possible and employees should also find new employment in other, growing areas at Airbus, it said.
Source: Stern
