Airbus said although the design was worthwhile enough to protect with a patent — like about 6,000 other ideas its engineers devise every year — it was not an immediate prospect for shuttling passengers from Heathrow to JFK. “This is not something that’s currently under active development,” Airbus said.
[1] http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/ba80c518-6492-11e4-b219-00144...
Your natural reaction might be to think this is an outrageous waste of people's time, and you'd be right. But if you don't do it, your competitors will and you will be vulnerable to patent suits that, because of how this works, are essentially impossible for you to avoid making yourself vulnerable to.
Similarly, if you're not utilizing it, then you probably don't need it.
It's why you hear pharmaceutical companies whine patents are strong enough, they need them longer. Automobile makers, aeroplane makers, ship builders, and "industrial" companies that make machinery and equipment rarely complain, they are pretty much ok with their duration, they might like them a little shorter but could take it or leave it. And on the other end if the spectrum we have software companies who are forced into the game because of consumer electronics companies (for whom perhaps something between 5-10 years would be best) taking patents on "features" they wanted to make as software... And the software companies pretty much want 0-5 years because this stuff is a all mostly math, or irrelevant, or under better protection by copyright, etc.
Patent limits were devised as a one size fits all solution not taking any of this diversity into account.