Airbus is pulling the plug on its MRO (maintenance, repair, and overhaul) Network, concluding that the effort has outlived its usefulness. The 17 surviving network members (an 18th, Canada's Aveos, closed last year) has received word from Airbus that the network will disband in early 2014, says Tom Anderson, Airbus senior vice president for customer services and support. While a network of MRO companies assembled by airframer makers sounds like a formula to generate business, Airbus executives say that was not the case. "There was never any commitment by Airbus to give any work to the network members," explains Michael Blyth, MRO development director. "It was a contractual relationship, but very much one where we exchange data in an attempt to establish benchmarks for maintenance performance, and to make sure MROs had what they needed to do a good job [for] our customers."
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