Mario Heinen (50) has been appointed Senior Vice President and Head of the A380 Programme with immediate effect. Mr Heinen has until now lead the Single Aisle Programme, and previously headed the Airbus Delivery Centres in Toulouse and Hamburg. He joined Airbus in 1999 coming from Lufthansa Technik, where he served as General Manager Aircraft Maintenance.

New Head of the Single Aisle Programme is Alain Flourens (49), currently Executive Vice President and Head of Airbus' Centres of Excellence (COEs). The Heads of the COEs will, from now on, directly report to the Executive Vice President Operations Karl-Heinz Hartmann (55). This flattens the management structure by removing one reporting level.

Mario Heinen and Alain Flourens will report to Tom Williams (54), who is herewith extending his role as Executive Vice President Programmes to all Airbus aircraft families. He reports directly to Airbus CEO, Christian Streiff.

"In four years as Head of the Airbus Single Aisle Programme, Mario Heinen demonstrated great leadership and outstanding management capabilities in the extremely successful ramp-up of this programme. Under his watch, the A320 family smoothly obtained record series production results. He previously achieved great customer satisfaction when he managed the Airbus Delivery Centres. Mario has strong support from Tom Williams, who has proven to be a courageous and decisive leader," Mr Streiff said.

"I am grateful for Alain Flourens' achievements as Head of the COEs. He successfully implemented the first step of rationalising the organisational structure of manufacturing units. He will now lead Airbus' largest and most successful programme."

Charles Champion (51) hands over the A380 programme to Mario Heinen as the A380 moves from development and certification to the ramp-up of the series production. He has been appointed special advisor to the CEO Christian Streiff.

"I would like to thank Charles Champion on behalf of all employees at Airbus for his exceptional contribution to bring the A380 up to the final stages of certification. I'm pleased that he will continue to share his vast experience with us at Airbus in his new advisory role," Mr Streiff said.

The Airbus management team is currently working on a review of the A380 industrial situation and the preparation for the launch of the A350. Christian Streiff confirms his announcement made in July at the Farnborough Airshow to report about his findings by the end of September.

Airbus is an EADS joint company with BAE Systems.