Face value: A new pilot for Airbus

Gustav Humbert is the first non-Frenchman to take the controls

SEEN from Brussels, Berlin or London, Airbus is a fine example of European co-operation at its best. It is a shiny, profitable symbol of high technology, and a rare example of the old continent leading the world in a key industry. But to the French, the Toulouse-based firm is a national champion. When Gustav Humbert, a German engineer who has worked for Airbus for 25 years, succeeded Noel Forgeard, a Frenchman, as chief executive of the aircraft firm in June, he was the first non-Frenchman to get the top job at Airbus. The news was greeted with dismay in some sections of the French press. “Toulouse falls to the Germans”, screamed one headline.

Mr Humbert appears entirely unruffled by all the fuss. He acknowledges that, in succeeding Mr Forgeard, he has a hard act to follow. “Noel brought Airbus to a level of success that was unprecedented,” he says, truthfully enough. Under Mr Forgeard, Airbus was transformed from a design and marketing consortium into a single company. It snatched market leadership from Boeing, winning more orders and delivering more planes than its rival in recent years, while breaking the American firm's monopoly at the top end of the aircraft market - launching the super-jumbo A380 to rival Boeing's venerable 747. In the process it achieved profit margins superior to those of its competitor; a feat that was quite independent of its controversial state aid.

Flushed with this success, Mr Forgeard did his best to keep a tight control on Airbus even as he was promoted to become chief executive of its parent company EADS. In part, Mr Forgeard's actions simply reflected the reluctance of a dynamic boss to let go of a company that he had done so much to build. But it also fitted into a pattern of domineering French behaviour in Franco-German business ventures that had already caused controversy in the pharmaceutical and engineering sectors - and provoked Gerhard Schroder, the German chancellor, to complain of French economic nationalism. The clash over the control of Airbus led to a bad-tempered boardroom row, which leaked into the press earlier this year. In the end, Mr Forgeard kept oversight of Airbus at EADS, but had to accept a German co-chief at EADS and a German boss of Airbus - Mr Humbert.

The contrast between the two men could not be sharper. The Frenchman has an obvious, impish sense of humour, a stage-French accent and a tendency never to miss a chance to get a rise out of Boeing. Mr Humbert's style is “international executive understated ” - -his wit is sardonic rather than uproarious. Not for him the provocative outbursts over the famous Airbus lunch table, designed to cause uproar thousands of miles away in Seattle. In barely accented English (the company language at senior levels) Mr Humbert suavely downplays the bitterness of the row with the Americans over state aid to Airbus, which has led to proceedings at the World Trade Organisation that will get under way this month, and expresses a hope for a negotiated solution. Mr Forgeard's Gallic urge to tweak the tail of the Americans is noticeably absent.

But the transition from Mr Forgeard to Mr Humbert will be about substance, as well as style. Under the Frenchman, Airbus was essentially a European champion, designed to counter the might of America's Boeing. Mr Humbert seems to be thinking of turning it into a global company that can counter an increasingly global Boeing. If his strategy takes wing over the next decade, the world aircraft market could turn into a battle between a European-Chinese conglomerate led by Airbus, and an American-Japanese alliance dominated by Boeing.

Hello world

This strategy could be portrayed as a break with Airbus's Eurocentric past. But it could equally be seen as part of the company's natural evolution. Airbus has already grown from a Franco-German joint-venture into a fully fledged European affair, with Britain and Spain as shareholders and Italy's aircraft industry a key supplier. Mr Humbert now sees his role as taking the company a stage further, and turning it into a truly global business. After taking over his first overseas visit was to China, where Airbus has a joint-venture - an engineering centre with a local aircraft manufacturer. The Chinese have been offered a 5% risk-bearing share of the new A350 mid-sized long-haul aircraft that the company will formally launch in the next two weeks. He envisages a similar arrangement to that which Boeing enjoys with the Japanese aircraft industry, which is due to build about a third of Boeing's new 787 aircraft in Japan.

Mr Humbert's vision of globalisation is based on pure pragmatism. “If we do not get China to contribute to our aircraft, then we are not going to get our aircraft into China,” he says. He sees more such collaboration with local partners in India and Russia, both of which are potentially huge markets for Airbus planes. In the short-term Airbus's new boss has been fortunate enough to take over at a time when demand is strong. Globally, aircraft orders look set to top the record 1,631 seen in 1989 - with 375 deliveries for Airbus alone. The company is busily recruiting engineers in Europe to deal with expansion and new product launches. It needs 1,000 new people to deal with delays and cost over-runs on the A380.

But when he looks over the horizon, Mr Humbert sees much of the firm's future growth being absorbed by joint-venture partners and other suppliers outside Europe. Airbus even plans a factory in Louisiana to build air-refuelling tankers for the American air force. The sight of a “European” industrial champion manufacturing planes inside the United States for the American military might baffle nationalists in both France and the United States. But it would make sound business sense for Airbus. And, fortunately for the company, that is what seems to matter most to Gustav Humbert.

Gustav Humbert is the first non-Frenchman to take the controls of Airbus.