EADS Appoints Rail Chief and Outsider to Top Spots
July 3, 2006
French co-chief executive Noel Forgeard and the head of Airbus, Gustav Humbert, a German, stepped down on Sunday under pressure from their largest shareholders -- the French government, the Lagardère Group of France, and DaimlerChrysler of Germany.
Forgeard and Humbert had been under intense pressure to quit since the news of the A380 delays in mid-June wiped 5.5 billion euros ($7 billion) off EADS’s market value and left Airbus trailing US rival Boeing.
The chief of France’s state-owned SNCF rail company, Louis Gallois, is to replace Forgeard. Gallois, 62, is a former head of French state company Aerospatiale, whose Toulouse factories are now part of EADS.
Gallois also ran aero-engine manufacturer Snecma, now part of the defense and communications group Safran. He is already an EADS board member.
Christian Streiff, 51, a former deputy CEO of French building materials group Saint Gobain, is to succeed Humbert as the head of Airbus.
Streiff is an industry outsider, reportedly brought in because of his experiences in managing complex industrial processes. Bilingual in French and German, he worked for 15 years on behalf of glassmaker Saint Gobain in Germany.
German EADS head stays on
The position of Tom Enders, who remains the German co-CEO of EADS, has now been significantly strengthened. Enders is to assume responsibility for the Airbus shareholder committee.
In an effort to preserve the delicate balance of national power inside the company, Streiff will report to Enders. Under the previous management set-up, Humbert had reported to Forgeard himself.
German Economics Minister Michael Glos welcomed the change in EADS leadership, saying in a statement on Monday that the decision showed the company "recognized its responsibility for its core business, Airbus."
Glos also said he hoped the new management structure "would be received positively by the market."
But on Monday, EADS had failed to bounce back from its recently trampled share price. The group's shares initially rose as much as 1.7 percent, but then fell again by more than 2 percent.
EADS shares fell 26 percent when A380 delays were announced on June 14.