Airbus is scrapping its original plans for the new A350 and plans to relaunch the program as a completely new range of aircraft that moves further into Boeing 777's market territory.

The company's new President and CEO Christian Streiff stopped short of an outright industrial launch yesterday at the Farnborough Air Show, but he said the launch was scheduled to take place in the first days of October, with development work continuing at the same speed until then.

The European manufacturer plans to spend about EUR8 billion on the aircraft, about double the amount slated for the first A350. The A350 XWB (extra-widebody) will feature a new, wider fuselage, a new wing and more modern engines, compared with the original plan. But it will also enter service in mid-2012, two years later than anticipated.

The A350 will come in three versions: the A350-800 with 270 seats, the A350-900 with 314 seats and the A350-1000 with 350 seats in a three-class configuration. All three variants will have a range of 8,500 nautical miles, Airbus claims. The A350-900 will be the first aircraft to enter service in mid-2012, with first flight in mid-2011. The A350-800 will follow in early 2013 and the A350-1000 in early 2014.

The relaunched A350 is bigger than the original aircraft and is being pitched both against the Boeing 787 and 777. Airbus claims the A350-900s block fuel consumption per seat will be 7% better than that of the 787-9 and 30% better than the 777-200ER's. The shift in its widebody strategy also means that Airbus may make its recently introduced models A340-500 and A340-600 obsolete, but would leave more room for the A330 as an intermediate aircraft for medium-long sectors. Emirates Airline President Tim Clark recently said, however, that Airbus needs to offer an aircraft between the 350-seater and the 550- seat A380. The decision in favor of the A350 also means that Airbus is moving away from its "four engines for long-haul" claim, upheld for many years.

The A350XWB will be 12 inches wider than the A330, also making it wider than the 787. The all-new fuselage means Airbus can no longer use the A330/340 tooling to assemble the aircraft. Chief Operating Officer Customers John Leahy said the aircraft will feature the biggest windows available in the industry. Cabin humidity will be at up to 20%, while cabin pressure will be equivalent to 6,000 feet or less.

Leahy also revealed Airbus is working on getting a second engine manufacturer on board, in addition to Rolls-Royce. The engines will have a 75,000- to 95,000-pounds' thrust range and allow the aircraft to cruise at Mach 0.85. The wings will be swept by 33 degrees, three degrees more than planned in the earlier version. In the cabin, an eight- or nine-abreast economy section can be offered by the airlines.

Streiff said at the Farnborough Air Show that he has had "kind of a vertical takeoff" in his two weeks on the job. Earlier this month, he replaced Gustav Humbert, who stepped down as a result of the A380 production delay. Streiff said his No. 1 priority is to regain the confidence of customers and shareholders.

"Airbus is in the middle of a serious crisis with its customers," he admitted. "We need to find our self-confidence." Streiff said that continuing internal studies are to lead to a new production schedule for the A380 and that the schedule should be published as soon as possible.