The type of research conducted by Airbus is likely to gather information required for single pilot operations.
Extended automatic functions would reduce workload to enable single pilot operation, but require a new automatic, autonomous capability to provide recovery in the event of incapacitation.
The current standard of automation, software, and implementation could achieve such an operation, but certification often depends on pilot involvement in extreme situations.
A difficulty for single pilot ops is being able to prove a sufficiently high level of system safety for commercial operation; both with a complicated system (todays systems), and also with a self-adapting 'complex' software system which might be required in an autonomous (pilot-less) role.
Quoting the 737 is meaningless in this context, being at least two generations out of date.