BERLIN (AFP) -- The European aerospace group EADS might cancel the sale of factories owned by its aircraft manufacturing unit Airbus and group them instead into a new division, a press report said yesterday.

The European Aeronautic Defense and Space Company might decide not to sell three Airbus German plants as well as EADS's own factory in the southern city of Augsburg, the daily Sueddeutsche Zeitung said, without identifying its sources.
Airbus had planned to outsource or sell seven sites as part of a broad restructuring plan, including four in Germany, two in France and one in Britain.
But Sueddeutsche Zeitung said the plan had been put in question by the euro rise against the dollar, which has discouraged potential bidders for the factories, while also hurting profitability at Airbus.
The plane maker produces mainly within the eurozone but sells its aircraft in dollars, leaving it vulnerable to serious foreign exchange effects, and a potential buyer of the plants could suffer as a result.
In an interview published Thursday by the German news weekly Der Spiegel, Airbus chief executive said the euro's current record-breaking level against the dollar would result in ""massive losses.""
Meanwhile, EADS hopes to reduce its dependence on Airbus by 2020 through targeted acquisitions and a greater focus on defense and security, a French press report said.
The financial newspaper Les Echos, citing an EADS strategy paper, said an initiative aimed to ""reduce dependence on Airbus, which now accounts for 68 percent of sales"" at EADS and, until 2006, the lion's share of its profits.