Good thing there will be two presidential 747s for another 25 years then. if we leave our country in the hands of MBA's and the smartest guys in the room 25 years from now the next presidential plane will be airbus or Chinese. Covid is the final blow for Boeing(short of bailout) the problems started with mangemtn change and move to Chicago, form there its all predicatable. A company run by "professionals" who belive they can anything from toothpaste to GM to Harley to Boeing. Lack of investment in product and evelopment because resources financial and intellectual are going to share buybacks so management can get more than adequatly compensated and shareholders can have a 10-20 year ride before alighting on the next company. Think of a swarm of locusts. The finance guys excuse is its an efficient allocation of capital, and in theory thats correct. The downside is peverse incentives always take it too far and whats left is a hollow core. The law of unintended consequences. A tax code that does not allow executive salaries above $1million to be deducted as an expense, moved compensation to stock options, and voila. Turbocharge that with wall street which is all about getting money as long as you dont go to jail. Wall street where your acomplishments are measured purely by cash pile, and what do we expect. Look at the makeup of the Boeing board. Hows that goign to fix things. Bowign will survive because Trump wont let it die but in every other way its dead and short of real management that wont change. Harley is no different. You cant have a plane manufacturer or a motorcycle manufacturer primarily run by people who do not live and breathe the product.
Financial engineering is like CV-19. It eventually kills the host. Sent from my iPhone using FerrariChat
Lol, sad but true. A sucessful parasite does not kill its host, and our boides have many symbiotic relationships with batteria etc. But any blood sucker eventualy proliferates to kill its host, its nature.
Boeing already had talked about taking over fuselage production from Triumph Group a few years ago. No sales will kill it, but I bet a few more "new order" freighters will end up being made before production stops. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-11-20/boeing-747-nears-end-of-line-as-triumph-shutters-storied-factory
That the MAX has not been re-certified is a political mess that should not be happening. The FAA is scared of its own shadow and playing to appease folks that want sound bites. Foreign regulatory authorities as relishing this as their opportunity to thumb their nose at the FAA and now trying to prove they have some special knowledge of aircraft certification. Some of those same foreign authorities want so skip over their acceptance of pilots with too few skills. Agreed on the fact that the engines drive the majority of the efficiency gain. That said, if Boeing jumps first for the next generation of engine then Airbus will have a lag time as they will want to run the natural course of the current product. As the narrow body is stretched and further stretched both Airbus and Boeing will need to face a resistance point that was found with the 757-300 - it made the boarding and unloading process take longer than they could accept. Airbus may come to face this issue even sooner with the XLR as they are eliminating Door 2 as part of the changes from the 321.
The freighter is the only real future for the -8 although Boeing has kept waiting for this demand to materialize for several years. Maybe there will be a couple (less than 5) VIP sales but all but one of the usual suspects already have their finished and in service. There is one green -8 that was for VIP that has been parked in Switzerland with the outfitting never started since it was delivered several years ago.
Am wondering if the Starliner problem will hurt Boeing. How much? It appears to be be a software issue, but I've heard that NASA is requiring that every line of code has to be checked before it can launch again. This is predicted to take over a year, maybe a year and a half. Dragon has now docked on the ISS today with their next mission to be in 4-5 months.
This interesting video contends that Boeing's problems started when they snubbed new airline jetBlue, which caused them to order A320s instead. Not wanting to lose a similar order from American Airlines, Boeing agreed hastily to update the 737 to compete with the A320neo, and the result was the 737MAX.
30% in 2019 https://www.forbes.com/sites/greatspeculations/2020/01/02/how-much-of-boeings-revenues-comes-from-the-us-government/#85b54c95144e
The MQ-25 was definitely a win for Boeing and it looks like the Loyal Wingman will be, too. X-37B has been a big success, too. ULA not a huge success for Boeing right now with the failure to reach ISS. Some wins, some losses.
Having worked on the original tanker in 1954 this KC-46 thing is aggravating to me. I know that the design target is different and that there are more operational requirements but why the hell haven't they been addressed? When I was there and a small part of many new programs I saw new challenges attacked with the best people available and there was never a let- up until they were solved. Successful answers to new concepts weren't always attained but there was a relentless effort to get the right answer and they were eventually done..
Its actually more like 45% when you include services. In 2019 Boeing Defense made $26b in revenue. Boeing Global services made $8b in revenue from the government. Overall revenue was $76b. Defense and Global Services combined for 5.3b in earnings vs Commerical's $6.6b loss. Keep in mind that Defense is far more than just the headline programs like KC-46 and T7. The KC-46 is doing poorly mostly do to a specific supplier as well as changing requirements from the customer (although there have been some internal fumbles as well). The T7 isn't overly profitable yet as it isn't delivery aircraft yet. Meanwhile the rest of the defense side keeps chugging along quietly producing aircraft and making money. The vertical lift division with the Apache, V-22 and Chinook aren't as flashy, but they keep making the DoD happy and making a good profit too.
For reference, Lockheed Martin Aeronautics (based in Fort Worth) is 27% of Lockheed Martin Corporation (based in Bethesda).
That is precisely what it is. Interesting parallel in that: Boeing acquires McDonnell Douglas, who promptly takes over running the place; Lockheed Martin acquires General Dynamics, who promptly takes over running the place! The old Lockheed-California Company (CALAC) was shut down and eventually demolished; employees either relocated to Fort Worth or Marietta, which used to be the Lockheed-Georgia Company (GELAC). Our plant here is actually leased from the USAF; officially it is Air Force Plant 6, and they could kick us out if they ever really wanted to. (The first tenant, during WW2, was Bell Aircraft, who built B-29s under license from Boeing. Old locals still call the place "The Bell Bomber Plant".)
Looks like the 737 Max did two test flights last week. Tuesday and Friday: https://flightaware.com/live/flight/BOE803/history
The FAA is now getting picky on the 777X. Getting even for the Max and showing they are not just a lot of me too bureaucrats, I guess.
The FAA may be picky, but wait until the Europeans (EASA) need to certify the MAX.... good luck. I've heard they are talking about using the Airbus 'template' to check the MAX...
A prominent Wall Street speculator, with a very good track record, predicts that Boeing will declare Chapter 11 bankruptcy, though they will be bailed out by the federal government. He also predicts that the 737 MAX will never return to service, which will mean scrapping an awful lot of airplanes! Does anyone agree with him?
If it wasn't 2020 I'd say absolutely not but I've seen crazier things this year so yes it's possible. But not probable.
