Any airline that orders the A350 is one less 7E7 that Boeing will sell--that has got to hurt. Boeing wanted to have 200 firm orders by the end of the year and came up short because many airlines were holding out to see what airbus was going to do.

The A350 is no more a refresh of the A330 than the Boeing 737/700-900's to the 737/100s are and the 747-400's are to the 747-100's. How can one say the 7E7 is going to be a better airplane than the A350? What are the specs for the A350? To most passengers, both planes will still be long silver tubes with too many seats stuffed in them.