By Bradley Perrett and Mark Bendeich LONDON, Feb 20 (Reuters) - European aircraft maker Airbus SAS has rescued a key order from Britain's Virgin Atlantic Airways Ltd by arranging new financing for the deal, which is worth more than $1 billion. An industry source said the manufacturer had arranged for Virgin Atlantic, suffering from weak traffic, to get a loan from a third party to finance the order for 10 A340-600 wide-body planes, which the airline had considered cancelling. "The big issue for us has been 'can we take delivery of these aircraft at all?'," a spokesman for Virgin Atlantic [VA.UL] said, confirming that the airline would now accept the planes from the middle of this year, as originally scheduled. Singapore Airlines Ltd (SIAL) owns 49 percent of Virgin Atlantic. Airbus is 80 percent owned by European Aeronautic Defence & Space Co NV (EADS) (EAD) (EAD) with British aerospace and defence group BAE Systems (BA) owning the remaining 20 percent. The spokesman originally said that the new arrangement was an operating lease arranged through Airbus but later said that the airline was not releasing the details of its financing. An Airbus spokesman said the manufacturer had not leased the planes to Virgin and would still register Virgin Atlantic, not a lessor, as the buyer. "We have arranged long-term financing for the aircraft," he said. He declined to give details, but the industry source said the financing was a loan and the lender was not Airbus. Airbus said that the price of the planes was unchanged. The airline, which earlier said it had got a better price, later said that the entire deal, including pricing, was "substantially" the same as its original order. The financing deal was widely reported by British newspapers and broadcasters on Wednesday as a new order, but Virgin Chairman and founder Richard Branson signed the contract for the planes in late 1997 amid great publicity. 747 COMPETITOR Airbus catalogue prices value 10 A340-600s at about $1.9 billion, but it is an industry norm that aircraft buyers routinely get hefty discounts to listed prices. Virgin Atlantic is a launch customer for the new A340-600 model, making the deal particularly important to Airbus. Retaining the Virgin order became crucial for Airbus after another launch customer, Swissair Group, collapsed last year. Manufacturers and other buyers rely on the first customers to iron out inevitable problems with new models. The new model, carrying about 380 passengers, is especially important to the manufacturer as a near competitor plane to Boeing Co's (BA) 747. Virgin Atlantic has been trying to renegotiate the A340-600 deal since the September 11 hijacked plane attacks in the United States hit demand for transatlantic air travel, the foundation of the long-haul airline's business. "We have had this order for a couple of years but post September 11 we reviewed all of our orders and we have reduced significantly our costs by about 20 percent," the Virgin Atlantic spokesman told Reuters. "So this order was in doubt for some while and we think Airbus have had a good negotiation and we are able to confirm that we will take these aircraft from this summer," he said. Demand for air travel, especially from tourists, had already begun to pick up across the Atlantic, he added. VENDOR FINANCING Airbus Commercial Director John Leahy expressed impatience last year with Virgin's desire to alter the terms of its A340-600 order. He was emphatic that planes due for delivery in 2002 and already under construction could not be delayed. Since September 11 wary investors have been watching Airbus and U.S. rival Boeing for any signs of excessive vendor financing, whereby the companies could burden their balance sheets with aircraft that contracted customers could now afford only to rent, not to buy. BAE told analysts in December that Airbus's exposure to completed aircraft would rise to $6 billion this year from $4 billion this year. Rolls-Royce Plc (RR) will supply engines for Virgin Atlantic's aircraft. Engine makers, whose products account for 20 to 25 percent of the value of a plane, can also help to finance orders.