Rivals Boeing and Airbus unite at Australian Aviation Summit

The session, “Bigger than Competition”, brings together Stephen Forshaw, Airbus Chief Representative for Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific, and Dr Kimberly Camrass, Boeing’s Head of Sustainability for Asia Pacific and India, moderated by Jake Nelson, Senior Journalist at Australian Aviation.

While competition has long driven innovation in aerospace, organisers say the sector now faces challenges no single manufacturer or nation can solve alone. Geopolitical uncertainty is reshaping supply chains, decarbonisation targets are forcing a rethink of propulsion and fuels, and workforce shortages are straining the ecosystem from hangars to flight decks.

Momentum Media’s Defence & Aerospace Lead, Steve Kuper, said the session reflects a real shift in the sector.

“For decades the industry’s default posture has been adversarial – Boeing versus Airbus, prime versus prime. What we’re seeing now is recognition that decarbonisation pathways, sovereign workforce pipelines and resilient supply chains are pre-competitive problems. You can’t out-compete a skills shortage, and you can’t out-compete a shared emissions target,” Kuper said.

Kuper said the willingness of two historic rivals to appear together signals how seriously the sector treats these shared risks.

“When you get Airbus and Boeing on the same stage having an honest conversation about collective ambition, that’s not symbolic – it’s recognition the challenge has outgrown the old rules of engagement. Sustainable fuel supply chains, next-generation propulsion, airport infrastructure – none of that gets solved by one manufacturer moving faster than the other,” he said.

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He noted the Australian angle carries particular weight.

“Australia sits a long way from the traditional centres of aerospace manufacturing, so workforce, sovereign capability and supply chain resilience land differently here. Hearing how two of the world’s largest primes see room to work together, rather than around each other, will be one of the more valuable conversations at this year’s summit,” Kuper said.

With Forshaw bringing a Pacific-shaped Airbus perspective and Camrass offering Boeing’s regional sustainability lens, the session closes the summit less as a wrap-up than a challenge: in an industry built on competition, the road ahead may depend just as much on what the sector builds together.