Airbus is the aeronautical manufacturing division of the Airbus Group. Headquartered in Blagnac, France, it has production and manufacturing facilities predominantly in France, Germany, Spain and the United Kingdom. At these 4 locations alone, Airbus employs approximately 63,000 people and also opened a final assembly plant in Tianjin, China in 2009. Airbus also has subsidiaries in the United States, Japan and India. (Airbus.com)Airbus Industrie began as a consortium of European aviation companies to provide competition to American companies such as Boeing, McDonnell Douglas and Lockheed. Despite numerous small European airlines, none have managed more than a relatively short production run (Nicholls, 2001). In 1991, Jean Pierson, then CEO and managing director of Airbus Industrie, described a number of factors that explained the dominant position of American aircraft manufacturers: the land mass of the United States made air travel the preferred mode of travel; a 1942 Anglo-American agreement placed responsibility for improvements in aviation on the United States; and World War II had left America with an advanced and well-structured aviation industry." (Nicholls, 2001) Therefore, the Airbus Mission Statement states: "In order to strengthen European cooperation in the field of aviation technology and therefore promote economic and technological progress in Europe, to take appropriate measures for the joint development and production of an airbus." In 1959 Hawker Siddeley, a group of British manufacturing companies, had advertised a "Airbus" version of the Armstrong Whitworth AW.660 Argosy aircraft, which would "be capable of carrying up to 126 passengers on ultra-short routes at a direct operating cost of 2d. per million seats...... middle of paper...... Ground the Airbus A380?"Martin, Grant. "Emirates A380 arrives in New York!." Gadling.com. Np, 3 August 2008. Web.Michaels, D. (7 April 2006). “BAE in talks with EADS to sell its 20% stake in Airbus; the British company is increasingly focusing on the defense market, especially in the United States." The Wall Street Journal. Harrison, Michael (June 15, 2006). "BAE launches attack on EADS over Airbus superjumbo alert" . The Independent.Dougherty, Carter (3 July 2006). “Senior Airbus and EADS officials resign”. New York Times.Hotten, Russell (4 October 2006). "BAE vote clears sale of Airbus stake". Daily Telegraph(UK). "Streiff resigns as Airbus CEO". BBC News. 9 October 2006. Frost, Laurence (2 March 2007). Airbus unions call for strike Tuesday over job cuts." SignOnSanDiego.Hoyle, Craig (28 April 2008). "Hercules support deal transforms operations of the RAF". International flight.