Sharing insightful things from books I'm reading. @fj@mastodon.social
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16% complete! Frederic's Bookshelf has read 2 of 12 books.
On the 10th of April 1969, the UK government pulled out of the Airbus A300B project, citing that the project was a losing horse and that it was "a certain losing proposition". It further claimed that the BAC Three-Eleven will be a roaring success with its 40 pre-orders.
— Airbus : La véritable histoire by Pierre Sparaco (Page 202)
History only remembers one of these two airplane projects.
One thing that I did not appreciate enough until reading the book is how little the UK actually cared about creating a European aerospace company, unlike the French and Germans.
The UK was participating in Airbus International's A-300 program only to keep a foot into the door in case their own BAC Two-Eleven and Three-Eleven would not work out. Even Rolls-Royce was not really taking Airbus seriously, constantly delaying the project and not allocating much ressources to it, while claiming otherwise in tripartite meetings with the French and Germans.
Le 9 août 1967, Roger Béteille expose aux Anglais sa manière de construire un programme international à organiser avec une volonté omniprésente d'efficacité. Il imagine que chacun des partenaires industriels serait chargé d'un domaine complet, conduit par une équipe autonome mais s'intéressant de très près aux tâches confiées aux autres, le tout étant conduit par une direction par consensus.
— Airbus : La véritable histoire by Pierre Sparaco (Page 166)
From its beginning, Airbus ran as a distributed company, having to distribute tasks across different sites.
Each site being assigned a specific domain and being able to operate autonomously, while still being able to check tasks done by others is a good model for running other distributed projects.
Apollo, Ariane, Artemis… les programmes spatiaux se présentent à nous comme les épisodes d’une glorieuse …
Inspired by @sogo7@mastodon.social :)
De part et d'autre de la Manche, les industriels rêvent secrètement de suprématie européenne tout en sachant qu'ils sont condamnés à s'entendre.
— Airbus : La véritable histoire by Pierre Sparaco (Page 81)
Description of the talks between the British Aircraft Corporation & Sud-Aviation in 1964 on dreaming of being able to build a European 200-seater aircraft to compete with Boeing.
Longtemps, l’espace a été perçu comme un ailleurs éloigné qu’une poignée d’astronautes explorait afin de repousser les frontières de l’inconnu. …
Today Novo Nordisk is Denmark’s largest industrial enterprise and one of the most highly valued companies in the world. The …
Started reading as a first of a few books to understand successes in European industrial policy.
