How much worse can it get for Boeing?

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Viewing 15 posts - 31 through 45 (of 57 total)

  • Cedric_Statherby
    Participant

    Thank you Canucklad, and you are most welcome.

    I think the idea of a 797 might well be doing the rounds at Boeing. It would be a bold gamble (not to mention a huge loss of face to abandon the 737), but if they could create a wholly new plane that made other planes instantly obsolete, they might just survive on the sales of, for example, Dreamliners and 797s, as every airline in the world would need the modern planes.

    This actually happened in one other industry, where a single innovation by one player immediately rendered every competitor instantly obsolete. This was the luxury hotel industry in the UK. Right up until 1910 the standard was for hotels to offer communal bathrooms down the corridor – a not untypical ratio even for what today would be a 5-star hotel in all other respects might be 4 bathrooms for as many as 30 bedrooms. Then on 2nd March 1910, the Goring Hotel opened in Victoria, along with en suite facilities (and also central heating) in each and every bedroom. This was a world first, and as I say immediately every other luxury hotel in London was out of date and had to upgrade or suffer reduced business and pricing power.

    But it would be a huge gamble for Boeing, as a wholly new plane takes years and years to build. And they need to survive between now and its commerical launch

    1 user thanked author for this post.

    ASK1945
    Participant

    Cedric

    I must add my thanks also for such a clear explanation of why there are such problems with modern IT, for mega companies.

    I built my first database for my small company in 1978, writing the software using “Basic”, then rebuilt it from scratch in 1984 using PC-DOS. Next, with the introduction of Windows a few years later, I started all over and just transferred all my data across. After that, just incremental further add-ons to the original Windows software. It never crossed my mind that big companies with IT departments didn’t start from scratch each time.

    It also explains why BA systems seem to go down so frequently.


    canucklad
    Participant

    [quote quote=995873]It would be a bold gamble (not to mention a huge loss of face to abandon the 737[/quote]

    Ironically the 737 is a great plane and has served its operating airlines brilliantly. It’s a design classic albeit with a few bumps along the way
    The Ryanair & Southwest operations are probably the best examples of how brilliantly the aircraft can be utilised , and why Boeing should have been content with “good enough”, simply because “good enough” was much better than “good enough”

    1 user thanked author for this post.

    capetonianm
    Participant

    It’s a modern syndrome. One of the companies I worked for had a brilliant system which was clear, functional, stable, easy to train, all the most frequently used functionality was quick access, with the less frequently used stuff ‘behind’.

    Then they started employing brilliant young academics from programming schools who were cheap and fantastic programmers and built in more and more unnecessary bells and whistles, making the programmes front end heavy, slow, and prone to failure. None of the departments talked to each other so the common ‘look and feel’ which had made the system so user-friendly disappeared, and transaction codes were replaced by stupid little icons and drop-down menus like a children’s space invader game, meaningless error messages that nobody thought about :
    “Error 614X/212098**CD1539”

    The problem in essence was that these brilliant programmers had no idea what they were programming for or any understanding of the industry. It was all very ‘Alice in Wonderland’, and of course things went downhill very fast.

    When a global computer system crashes, people are inconvenienced, to put it mildly.

    When an aircraft computer system crashes, people are killed.

    ‘If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’ is something that Boeing, and thousands of other companies, should remember. Too late now for the hundreds who died in the 737MAX crashes.

    5 users thanked author for this post.

    Johnnyg
    Participant

    [quote quote=995873]But it would be a huge gamble for Boeing, as a wholly new plane takes years and years to build. And they need to survive between now and its commerical launch[/quote]

    Also a new plane requires new software, been there, done that, didn’t work!!!!


    Inquisitive
    Participant

    There are many sophisticated machinery run nowadays by software; but the basic mechanical design has to be perfect for the intended operation. A software can only improve the optimised operation of the machine and reduce human interference and time.

    In this case, the basic airframe with location of bigger engines do not make this plane aerodynamically perfect or airworthy. Managing that defect by software could be the fundamental deficiency.

    It may be a good idea to design a new airframe from scratch.

    1 user thanked author for this post.

    alainboy56
    Participant

    Well I asked the simple question and I got the in depth answers and explanations I needed to understand this ‘casino’ (it’s an Italian word look it up and its not somewhere you place your bets).
    Sincere thanks to Cedric_Statherby, and with added insight and wisdom from Chris in Makati and captonianm.
    If you are Christians Happy Easter one and all, and if not, as the late great Irish comedian Dave Allen used to say ‘May your God go with you’.
    For my sins, I am blocked/stuck under a 24hr curfew in the wonderful Holy Kingdom of Saudi Arabia — Al hamdulillah!


    Johnnyg
    Participant

    cwoodward
    Participant

    It seems the Boeing’s 777X project may be in increasing trouble.

    With the aircraft due for delivery next year it is still a long way from being certified and there are also endemic problems with the GE9X engines with little progress made in the past year towards fixing these problems.
    There is an increasing amount of noise on the internet that Boeing will be up to 3 years late with first delivers.

    Several large orders have been canceled to date and there are strong rumours that Cathay Pacific who were the launch customer of the 777 and also for this aircraft are about to cancel their entire 21 aircraft order in favour of extending the life of the newer aircraft in its existing 777 fleet and perhaps committing to more Airbus A350 aircraft for delivery in 2024.
    Personaly I feel that CX will stay with the 777X order as now delivery in 2021 has ceased to be important and 2023/4 would seem to be good timing.

    2 users thanked author for this post.

    Inquisitive
    Participant

    [postquote quote=996824][/postquote]

    And refused to pay Embraer the agreed amount for deal cancellation?


    canucklad
    Participant

    Never mind Boeing being in trouble ….

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-52436741


    Johnnyg
    Participant

    Johnnyg
    Participant

    Announced yesterday, it will only get worse with a glut of surplus aircraft being returned to the lessors or new orders being delayed.

    In April. Airbus delivered 14 aircraft, and Boeing only six.

    During the four months of 2020 Airbus delivered a total of 136 aircraft, while, according to FlightGlobal, Boeing managed to hand over only 56 planes.

    While Airbus has been mainly hit by the current crisis and the emerging consequences, Boeing has been affected by two crises at the same time – the coronavirus and 737 MAX grounding.

    Apart from plummeting deliveries, both planemakers are facing serious problems on the orders’ front. In light of the recent events airlines are not only not making new orders but actively deferring their bookings or even cancelling.

    This year Airbus has logged 299 net orders (the amount of orders considering all the cancellations and conversions). Although the number is lower than last year, it is still positive.

    Meanwhile Boeing cannot share the joy over its results. FligthGlobal reports that after four months of 2020 Boeing stands at -255 net orders. This means, that the company suffered more cancellations than new bookings.

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