The A400M is a military transport plane conceived to solve the necessities of eight European Air Force (Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Portugal, Spain, Turkey and the United Kingdom) to replace their fleets of Hercules C-130 and Transall C-160. The finality is to estandardizar the European fleet of tactical transports. The large-scale production will allow to lower the price of its cost. It will improve the interoperability level.

The total number of units required by these countries ascends approximately to 300. The initial order was: Belgium 7, France 50, Germany 73, Italy 16, Luxembourg 1,  Spain 27, 26 Turkey and United Kingdom 25, but in December of 2002 Berlin decided to shorten its order to 60 A400M. This will surely increase the total costs for the eight countries implied in its production. CASA, Aerospatiale, Airbus, Alenia, DASA, Flabel, Ogma and TAI among others participates in program A400M under management of Military Airbus. The responsibility of the new company is to handle the program of development of the A400M, known before like FLA. The first airplane will fly in the 2007, and the deliveries are predicted between 2009 and 2025. The first countries in receiving them will be France and Turkey.