https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-02-22/richard-aboulafia-on-troubles-at-boeing-i-ve-never-seen-anything-like-it
21 replies (most recent on top)
we have come full circle
Boeing leadership has accepted the ax.
True about a bailout in the end by big gov. Seems we are becoming a little china. Government owning everything.
I'd guess the government will bail Boeing out just like they did Chrysler, if it comes to that point.
Don't say we didn't warn you and even offer to help you...back in 2007:
https://www.rbogash.com/boeing_delay.html
https://www.rbogash.com/boeing_comments.html
But sadly, it's way too late to recover now.
https://www.faa.gov/newsroom/faa-halts-boeing-max-production-expansion-improve-quality-control-also-lays-out-extensive
FAA Halts Boeing MAX Production Expansion to Improve Quality Control,
Also Lays Out Extensive Inspection and Maintenance Process to Allow Boeing
737-9 MAX DeatҺtrap Aircraft to Return to Service
Wednesday, January 24, 2024
https://www.forbes.com/sites/marisagarcia/2024/02/27/boeing-made-safety-confusing-faa-expert-panel-finds/?sh=568d399a14bf
FAA Expert Panel Details Faults In Boeing Safety Management System:
The Federal Aviation Administration has published a 50-page final report by
an Organization Designation Authorization Expert Review Panel tasked by
Congress to evaluate the effectiveness of Boeing’s BA +2.3% safety management
system following recent incidents with the 737 MAX program.
The Expert Panel reviewed 4,000 pages of Boeing documents on
safety management, and conducted seven surveys, interviewed over
250 employees, and met with others at six Boeing locations.
It found that Boeing has made its SMS confusing to employees and failed to
implement a safety management culture fully to ensure its effectiveness.
Cost Over Conscience.
The panel also found that Boeing “sometimes” fails to make safety reporting
(non-punitive) and does not appropriately take pilot input on programs.
In all, the Expert Panel had 27 findings of concern in Boeing’s safety management
practices and made 53 recommendations.
“Each interview with Boeing employees started with an opening statement that
the Expert Panel was ‘…very interested in hearing your perspective on each topic.
However, it appears to some Expert Panel members that Boeing employees
viewed the Expert Panel’s work as an audit; not an opportunity to collaborate.
Interviewees asked minimal questions of the experts.
Some interviewees mentioned a briefing was provided by Boeing Legal
prior to the interviews,” the Expert Panel reported. (Due To Criminal Management)
AND
Lost Knowledge In A ‘Dispersed,’ ‘Diminishing’ Engineering Base
Boeing Has Failed, Not Will or Might Fail >> Has Failed <<
https://apnews.com/article/faa-boeing-deadline-safety-plan-18f607ad102e6bbe6200671273ff990c
**Boeing given 90 days by FAA to come up with a plan to improve safety and quality
of manufacturing**
The new deadline is being set as the FAA finishes an audit of assembly lines at the factory near Seattle, where Boeing builds planes like the 737 Max that suffered a door-panel blowout in January. Investigators say bolts that help keep the panel in place were missing after repair work on the Alaska Airlines jet at the Boeing factory.
Anyone else hearing that FAA will be suspending Boeing's manufacturing certificate for ALL models?
Lockheed Martin, on time and under budget.
My broad stroke is incorrect, but the F35 was "has drawn criticism for its unprecedented size, complexity, ballooning costs, and delayed deliveries": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_Martin_F-35_Lightning_II
However, it's not possible for Boeing to be competent in both the defense space and the consumer space. Defense and anything government breeds laziness and corruption because it's a reliable cash cow. As a result there is no incentive to make quality consumer products.
Just look at Google. They have a reliable cash cow in advertising and haven't built a quality product aside from it; all of their visible properties are the result of acquisitions.
If Boeing is focusing on defense by moving to DC, their consumer products can only go downhill.
Hahaha! I interviewed for an engineering job at Boeing. I could tell the managers were clueless about any technical aspects of my resume. Just interested in hearing me spew corporate buzz words. Just a bunch of empty suits! Glad I didn't take the job now!
@2xkg+1rft9zTT
“anything government related breeds laziness”
Other participants in the defense sector have been on-time and under budget.
It is highly unrealistic to paint all with such a broad brush, based on your
experiences working for such an inapt and corrupt organization.
Lockheed Martin, on time and under budget.
So it can be done.
Just not with the duplicitous inapt rabble that is -- Boeing Management --
It is now clear that Boeing is headed to breakup. There is no way they can complete their airline or military contracts without losing more money or lives.
You can't trust a company that both makes consumer products and defense products. With defense you have a reliable cash cow that you can use to recover from losses elsewhere. In addition, anything government related breeds laziness. Therefore you don't have an incentive to make a quality consumer plane.
https://jalopnik.com/retired-boeing-737-max-manager-walked-off-of-a-flight-a-1851289889
Retired Boeing 737 Max Manager Walked Off Of A Flight
After Refusing To Fly On The Plane
Ed Pierson reiterated that Boeing’s woes began around 2017
when supply chain issues led to aircraft being assembled
out of sequence. The pressure from management to crank
out planes lowered quality control standards and
employee morale.
He retired over these issues in August 2018 and
Lion Air Flight 610 cгashed October that year.
Pierson claimed that nothing has changed since the
Boeing 737 Max’s two cгashes.
Adding to all of Boeing’s self inflected crises,
Airbus has committed to a clean sheet design by the end
of this decade, this will be a replacement for their A320.
And before you say No-Way, this has been in the works
for some years now, while we have been sսcking our thumbs.
We Are Done, kaput, Finished, Period...
Shell company is being overly kind. More like a bloated corpse with executive maggots feasting on the last nourishment.
Can't imagine any other outcome at this point and seems like a well-orchestrated approach to reach this point. Only the corrupt Boeing executives benefit...and a true Jack Welch approach too.
Breakup seems highly likely and is a logical strategy given the current state of Boeing. Boeing is already largely just a shell company of only executives. Boeing already sold off most of their real estate holdings and only has assembly plants. Boeing only does final assembly...and with less than good assemblers and quality control. Boeing only has very unprofitable contracts and very unhappy customers. Boeing can't come close to successfully competing with its competition anymore.
It is now clear that Boeing is headed to breakup. There is no way they can complete their airline or military contracts without losing more money or lives. They don't have the talent to create innovative new products to successfully compete with other far more competent aerospace companies. Rest assured though that Boeing executives will continue to enrich themselves throughout this process.
I believe Boeing would like to spin off BDS, the way they spun off Wichita to Onyx, which became spirit aerosystems.
Onyx was composed of a bunch of Canadian pension investors.
Wichita was a much more stable investment. When the F18 finishes production and the F-15, there’s not a lot of future work.
The red hawk trainer is a small program. They have already lost the next generation helicopter program so the people in Philadelphia will struggle to stay employed. The next generation fighter doesn’t seem likely after loosing the F 35 decisively.
The point is BDS is not a good investment and no one would want to purchase that company given its limited future work.
It would be equivalent to finding someone who would be interested in buying McDonald Douglas, when their commercial aviation businesses is in a tailspin.
They may simply shut down the BDS side of the business and tell the government that they don’t want to fulfill these contracts that’s really the only option. I have to have the conversation that they lose money on every single ship said need to stop production, which is simply unacceptable given they were the only sole bidder.
The bottom line is they need to clean house on the BDS side of upper management who were involved with these contract bids.
Excerpt:
And the most obvious statement was ‘We don't have a future.’ Not only was it the dissolution of the company-wide strategy department, but there was a wholesale gutting of a lot of the business unit strategy department. So it wasn't a devolution story, it was a ‘we don't care’ story’ which was of course as baffling as it gets.
It sort of fits in with this nagging feeling in the back of my mind that the really awful performance is kind of okay to the folks at the top. Because ultimately their playbook is, well, about as deep as the Jack Welch GE playbook, which is, if things go to he-l, you simply break up the company.
And in that case, you know, performance doesn't matter, the future and strategy doesn't matter. You simply think — and indeed maybe the bad performance is kind of a plus in a strange way to regulators and everybody involved, customers, whatever. It almost becomes a relief when the company is broken up. That's of course an extreme departure scenario, but I can't think of any other explanations for doing that.
WOW!
It has been clear even before the Max accidents that Boeing has been in an unrecoverable flat spin into the ground for decades. Only Boeing stock hawks talk about Boeing turning things around...for obvious reasons that anyone with inside knowledge knows is untrue and just smoke and mirrors.
I hope we can somehow make a Cinderella story of Boeing. The thing that scares me most are the decision makers in our company.
He writes a lot of columns over at aviation week. I’ve read his columns for years. His dismal outlook for Boeing and Boeing management has gotten worse over the years.
This is the first time where he’s talking about Boeing not being able to come back. on paper this was the largest exporter in the United States, to see it go bankrupt from mismanagement is pretty eye-opening for people who don’t work there.
An informative and well-written article by a highly respected aerospace analyst, but this could have been written long ago...like in 2007...
https://www.rbogash.com/boeing_delay.html
https://www.rbogash.com/boeing_comments.html