The Airbus Company - a snapshot of the consortium
Circa 2008, there are only two major commercial airplane manufacturers - Boeing and Airbus. Boeing is an American company and has been in existence since the early days of commercial aviation.
Airbus on the other hand is relatively new (formed in 1970), and began as a consortium of four European national aircraft corporations, represented by France, Germany, Spain and Britain. In 2001, three of the four partner merged into a unified commercial enterprise called the EADS (European Aeronautic Defense and Space Company). EADS is headquartered in the Netherlands in Schiphol-Rijk. After the merge, 80% of Airbus was owned by EADS and 20% by BAE Systems (British Aerospace).
In 2006, BAE Systems sold off its shares to EADS for $5.25 billion making Airbus an EADS company.
As of 3 July 2007 42% of EADS stock is publicly traded on European stock exchanges, while the remaining 58% is owned by a “Contractural Partnership”. The latter is owned by SOGEADE (27.38%), DaimlerChrysler AG (22.41%), SEPI (5.46%) and Dubai Holding (3.12%). SOGEADE is owned by the French State and Lagardère, while SEPI is a Spanish state holding company. France also owns 0.06% of publicly traded stock. (source Wikipedia)
