# Boeing to move headquarters to Arlington,VA.



## Bob Dylan (May 5, 2022)

Just heard on the News that Boeing is moving its Headquarters from Chicago to Arlington,VA.

Looks like that after the Fiasco with the "New and Improved" 737, they've decided that going where the Power and the Money is ( Washington) is the way to go!


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## jis (May 6, 2022)

Actually in my mind the move to Chicago in the first place did not make any sense unless it was implementing a "get the heck out of Seattle to aynwhere where we can get a good deal for the moment", as the guiding principle.


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## JWM (May 6, 2022)

I have two grandsons at Boeing in the Seattle area. The company made a huge mistake by moving the executive offices away from the assembly plants. Then came the outsourcing of the MCAS software for the Max. Next was trying to assemble the 787 in an area that had zero tech base to save money. Now, another executive move to D.C. No wonder Airbus keeps growing.


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## jis (May 6, 2022)

JWM said:


> I have two grandsons at Boeing in the Seattle area. The company made a huge mistake by moving the executive offices away from the assembly plants. Then came the outsourcing of the MCAS software for the Max. Next was trying to assemble the 787 in an area that had zero tech base to save money. Now, another executive move to D.C. No wonder Airbus keeps growing.


Frankly, Boeing still appears to be floundering, unable to actually fix the root cause of many things that undermine it. Looks like now they have decided to see if being close to Washington can help to sweep the malady under the carpet by political manipulations, or at least that would be the cynical interpretation  which jibes with their public statements on the matter.


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## Metra Electric Rider (May 6, 2022)

jis said:


> Actually in my mind the move to Chicago in the first place did not make any sense unless it was implementing a "get the heck out of Seattle to aynwhere where we can get a good deal for the moment", as the guiding principle.


While it was good for us (and bad for us and a slap in the face to da Mare now that they are leaving) it did seem to me that it was to get away from labor unrest that might have gotten personal for some execs - and quite possibly, just that someone high up with good persuasion powers wanted to live in Chicago?


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## rickycourtney (May 6, 2022)

Being in Washington puts them in close proximity to their cash machine.

Any time it looks like Boeing might lose a federal contract... it will be easy for top execs (up to and including the CEO) to go "press the flesh" in the White House, the halls of Congress, or the corridors of the Pentagon.

This is a tacit admission that -- between the 737 MAX fiasco, the bumpy 787 rollout, major customer defections, the inability to launch a new "middle of market" airliner, and the totally botched merger with Embraer -- they're rapidly losing ground to Airbus in the commercial aircraft space.

The space division is also getting its clock cleaned by SpaceX -- the Falcon is a much less expensive launch vehicle compared to the aging Delta, and the Dragon is running circles (orbits) around the Starliner which has still yet to have a successful test flight.


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## Dakota 400 (May 6, 2022)

This makes no sense to me. This is the exact opposite of what they ought to do if they are going to change the location of their corporate office.

I find this announcement very odd in light of the announcement this week that the Justice Department had reached a deal with Boeing. No criminal conduct by Boeing executives over the 737 MAX issues/accidents, but Boeing has been fined $2.5 billion. 

This news has a "strange odor" about it in my opinion.


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## Devil's Advocate (May 6, 2022)

The biggest repercussion seems to be that regulators are finally pushing back on faults instead of rubberstamping business decisions. Unfortunately the move to DC seems intended to help sway regulators and stakeholders rather than address root causes. They may be named Boeing but we're really talking about the ghost of McDonnel Douglas.


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## Dakota 400 (May 6, 2022)

rickycourtney said:


> Being in Washington puts them in close proximity to their cash machine.
> 
> Any time it looks like Boeing might lose a federal contract... it will be easy for top execs (up to and including the CEO) to go "press the flesh" in the White House, the halls of Congress, or the corridors of the Pentagon.
> 
> ...



I don't disagree with your thinking. It's been disappointing to learn of the number of their business segments that have not been making a profit. But, does this corporate move make sense unless it is for political reasons? 

How much money is going to be spent to move from Chicago to Arlington, Virginia? This amount plus the large fine they are now obligated to pay----couldn't that amount of money be used better by the company? 

Boeing's stock price has recently been trending down. Not yet at the low we saw in 2020, though.


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## rickycourtney (May 6, 2022)

I'll also point out -- there's a reason why the predecessor companies to today's Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman got out of the commercial aircraft industry to focus on the defense industry... 

You get to build high-profit margin equipment, at huge price tags, under deadlines that are very "squishy."

Add to that, when you get into things like building missiles, you're likely to get few warranty requests when the item sits in a warehouse for a decade and then doesn't work perfectly the one time it's used and also destroyed.


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## rickycourtney (May 6, 2022)

Devil's Advocate said:


> Unfortunately the move to DC seems intended to help sway regulators and stakeholders rather than address root causes.


I didn't think about that in my first reply, but you're absolutely right. The top brass will also be in much closer proximity to "press the flesh" at FAA Headquarters.



Dakota 400 said:


> How much money is going to be spent to move from Chicago to Arlington, Virginia? This amount plus the large fine they are now obligated to pay----couldn't that amount of money be used better by the company?


The cost of the move is a drop in the bucket that is the company's 200+ billion dollars in annual operating expenses. That cost goes down if they're getting tax credits from the city they're moving to (they probably are). Add to that, they're in a leased building in Chicago, and it's been almost exactly 20 years since they moved in... so they're probably "up" on their lease.

A recent Reuters article said that the Chicago HQ has largely been a "ghost town" for the last couple of years as execs spent most of their time in Washington.


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## rickycourtney (May 6, 2022)

Another thought -- the original move to Chicago was largely seen as a pointless blunder. 

It came in the years after the merger with McDonnell Douglas -- and amid some of the nastiest battles with the union employees. So it gave the company a chance to move away from its home and angry employees in Seattle and the home of McDonnell Douglas in St. Louis. 

The move also put a lot of distance between the company brass and the engineers in Seattle. A lot of people have pointed to that as a contributing reason for the 737 MAX and 787 issues.

But picking Chicago was a headscratcher. The company has no historical ties to the city, it's not our country's financial powerhouse (New York) or political epicenter, and it's not home to a major customer (except United). They seemed to pick it because it was cheap and centrally located.


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## PaTrainFan (May 6, 2022)

rickycourtney said:


> I'll also point out -- there's a reason why the predecessor companies to today's Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman got out of the commercial aircraft industry to focus on the defense industry...
> 
> You get to build high-profit margin equipment, at huge price tags, under deadlines that are very "squishy."
> 
> Add to that, when you get into things like building missiles, you're likely to get few warranty requests when the item sits in a warehouse for a decade and then doesn't work perfectly the one time it's used and also destroyed.



And when your cost overruns become egregiously high, no problem, the Federal government compliantly writes more checks.


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## Deni (May 7, 2022)

Metra Electric Rider said:


> While it was good for us (and bad for us and a slap in the face to da Mare now that they are leaving) it did seem to me that it was to get away from labor unrest that might have gotten personal for some execs - and quite possibly, just that someone high up with good persuasion powers wanted to live in Chicago?


I'm curious why you think it was good for us. I see no benefit we got form Boeing being here and we gave them a truckload of cash. They didn't really even provide much in the way of jobs since they moved employees from Seattle.


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## Metra Electric Rider (May 7, 2022)

Deni said:


> I'm curious why you think it was good for us. I see no benefit we got form Boeing being here and we gave them a truckload of cash. They didn't really even provide much in the way of jobs since they moved employees from Seattle.


Several hundred high paying jobs came from Seattle which creates a exponential number of other jobs as well as the fact that a prestige company chose to locate in Chicago. People who actually work in corporate situations are very concerned about them leaving and what that could mean for the already stressed downtown job market.


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## PVD (May 7, 2022)

rickycourtney said:


> Another thought -- the original move to Chicago was largely seen as a pointless blunder.
> 
> It came in the years after the merger with McDonnell Douglas -- and amid some of the nastiest battles with the union employees. So it gave the company a chance to move away from its home and angry employees in Seattle and the home of McDonnell Douglas in St. Louis.
> 
> ...


Chicago gave them $$$$ incentives, and those obligated them to stay for 20 years. That time is coming to an end.


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## Saddleshoes (May 7, 2022)

Caterpillar moved their corporate HQ to Chicago (from Peoria) soon after Boeing. 
That move was a head scratcher too. 
Maybe Cat has a move in store too.


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## TWA904 (May 8, 2022)

Dallas and Denver were considered. Chicago paid United $60 million over 20 years that is now ending. Boeing wanted to forge a new identity and to be closer to major customers. Moving the headquarters to Arlington will also put them closer to the US headquarters of Airbus.


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## Deni (May 8, 2022)

Metra Electric Rider said:


> Several hundred high paying jobs came from Seattle which creates a exponential number of other jobs as well as the fact that a prestige company chose to locate in Chicago. People who actually work in corporate situations are very concerned about them leaving and what that could mean for the already stressed downtown job market.


I think if the company had just moved here without any sort of public money pledged you'd have a point. But with the level of taxpayer money extorted from the city and the state there really hasn't been a net positive for Chicago. (Also, right after the deal they moved their corporate jet operations to Gary, taking jobs that used to be at Midway Airport). We paid a lot of money for a fairly limited number of jobs.


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## rickycourtney (May 8, 2022)

TWA904 said:


> Boeing wanted to forge a new identity and to be closer to major customers.


Customers? More like customer. United is the only major airline based in Chicago.

They had already dropped their “all-Boeing” strategy in 1992.


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## jis (May 8, 2022)

rickycourtney said:


> Customers? More like customer. United is the only major airline based in Chicago.
> 
> They had already dropped their “all-Boeing” strategy in 1992.


I suppose they thought, mistakenly, that United had become Continental


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## Trogdor (May 8, 2022)

rickycourtney said:


> Customers? More like customer. United is the only major airline based in Chicago.
> 
> They had already dropped their “all-Boeing” strategy in 1992.



United dropped their “all-Boeing” fleet strategy in 1931 with the introduction of the Ford Tri-Motor. At no point in the jet era has United ever had an all-Boeing fleet.


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## BCL (May 8, 2022)

Trogdor said:


> United dropped their “all-Boeing” fleet strategy in 1931 with the introduction of the Ford Tri-Motor. At no point in the jet era has United ever had an all-Boeing fleet.



I specifically remember the Sioux City, IA crash in 1989. That was most definitely a DC-10.


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## PVD (May 8, 2022)

United flew lots of DC_8s


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## MARC Rider (May 8, 2022)

PVD said:


> United flew lots of DC_8s


Yeah, I flew in one once.


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## Devil's Advocate (May 8, 2022)

Trogdor said:


> United dropped their “all-Boeing” fleet strategy in 1931 with the introduction of the Ford Tri-Motor. At no point in the jet era has United ever had an all-Boeing fleet.


Seems like it was a US only fleet history that was broken at a time when United was Boeing’s biggest customer.








United Signs Airbus Deal in Blow to Boeing : Airlines: The carrier says it will lease 50 of the European-built planes. Deal is worth an estimated $2.4 billion.


United Airlines said Wednesday that it will lease 50 aircraft from Airbus Industrie, the first time the carrier has done a deal with the European aircraft group.




www.latimes.com


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## Dakota 400 (May 8, 2022)

MARC Rider said:


> Yeah, I flew in one once.



I have flown in a few McDonnell Douglas aircraft: DC-8, DC-10, MD-88's in various configurations. No complaints from me about any of these planes. 

I have sympathy for those in Chicago and Illinois who provided tax incentives to encourage a business to locate there and finally see, after the gravy train has ended, for the business to go elsewhere for another taxpayer subsidy with the "promise" of "oh, how so many jobs" will be created that may or may not actually happen.


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## neroden (May 8, 2022)

jis said:


> Frankly, Boeing still appears to be floundering, unable to actually fix the root cause of many things that undermine it. Looks like now they have decided to see if being close to Washington can help to sweep the malady under the carpet by political manipulations, or at least that would be the cynical interpretation  which jibes with their public statements on the matter.


The root problem was the "reverse takeover" by McDonnell Douglas. Many, many people have said this.

Boeing was a company run by engineers for engineers, and made good products they could be proud of. 

McDonnell Douglas was a company run by military-industrial-complex pigs at the trough, whose focus was on extracting excess profit from the government while providing shoddy products. This is a bad business model for a company like Boeing which was selling in a genuine competitive market like the commercial airplane market.

The McDonnell Douglas management took over, and wrecked Boeing. It cannot recover because it's a corporate culture problem. They decided to double down on the pigs at the trough business model. Commercial airlines will continue to try to buy quality planes. Airbus is slowly becoming less of a ward of the government, so it gets the business. There's actually an opening for a competently managed company, but I don't think Embraer can scale up. COMAC might take over the market in the long run.


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## MARC Rider (May 8, 2022)

neroden said:


> McDonnell Douglas was a company run by military-industrial-complex pigs at the trough, whose focus was on extracting excess profit from the government while providing shoddy products.



That has some disturbing implications for those of us whose national security is based, in part, on military aircraft produced under that business model. We can only hope that the industries supplying our rivals (Russia and China, in particular) have similar (or worse) management problems to Boeing (as taken over by McDonnell-Douglas).


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## WashingtonFlyer (May 9, 2022)

Not sure why anyone is surprised by this. Boeing's chief U.S. competitors are almost all headquartered in the DC area: Intelsat, Iridium, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, and General Dynamics. Some of Boeing's main overseas suppliers and competitors are also headquartered in the area: Rolls Royce and Airbus. 

Boeing has a 300,000 square foot office for fewer than 500 HQ employees. Thats a massive, massive waste of space post COVID. Nobody needs that much room.


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## neroden (May 9, 2022)

MARC Rider said:


> That has some disturbing implications for those of us whose national security is based, in part, on military aircraft produced under that business model. We can only hope that the industries supplying our rivals (Russia and China, in particular) have similar (or worse) management problems to Boeing (as taken over by McDonnell-Douglas).


Well, yeah. It is MUCH worse in Russia, and we now have proof of that. China, I don't know.

The good news (?) is that manned aircraft are militarily obsolete, with the exception of cargo planes, which have a fair amount of slack for bad design. We could always buy the massive cargo plane Ukraine is planning to rebuild, since they're our ally.

There seems to be nothing wrong with Aerovironment (maker of Switchblade and other drones). And Honeywell still makes consumer products and thinks like a consumer products company, and it's also one of the military drone suppliers. General Atomics, another military drone supplier, is pure MIC and arguably makes things too expensive, but is run by technologists with a focus on quality technology. 

So there's one advantage of free-market capitalism: the military can send the contract to a new company which has a better attitude, and it *has* been happening recently. Not all military contracts are bribe-driven in the US, thank goodness.

The more old-line Military-Industrial-Complex US drone manufacturers are also making OK but overpriced drones. Turkey is making a much better drone which everyone is buying now (the Bayraktar), and they're our ally, so we could probably buy those if we needed to.


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## jis (Jun 16, 2022)

Looks like while Boeing is busily rearranging its deck chairs while being unable to deliver any new aircraft in a timely fashion it is about to lose its long time customer in a big way for its entire wide body fleet renewal program. Looks like Tata owned rejuvenated Air India is going whole hog with Airbus.









France's Airbus close to clinching Air India deal for 50 A350 aircraft


The first aircraft is likely to be inducted by first half of 2023




www.business-standard.com


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## JWM (Jun 16, 2022)

Boeing has several units. Most well-known are the Boeing Commercial Airplane and military units. I have to reveal that I have two grandsons, both mechanical engineers, at Boeing in the Seattle area. I have also met a Vice-President of Airbus a few years ago. Boeing's problems started when they moved the Executive Offices out of Seattle to Chicago. Then they compounded the problem by building an assembly plant in an area with zero technical background (South Carolina for the 787 assembly). Next came the outsourcing of the MCAS programing to $9 an hour "engineers" and the Max fiasco. They could move the Executive Offices to hell, and it still would not solve the problems. Airbus builds planes in Mobile, AL and a lot of other places with few issues. How do they do it? Boeing had better find out Both companies use GE/Safran engines some of which are made in Evendale, OH.. so that is no issue either.

Bottom line is that you save nothing and bring on disasters when you leave an area where you had an incredibly talented and loyal assembly, design and executive base (Seattle area). There are many muti-generation employees at Boeing. They know how to build planes, but many are in a union. Did it really save Boeing anything by trying for non-union assembly people in S.C. when there was zero educational and experience background in aircraft assembly? This member of this forum thinks not. The problem is dimwit executives and myopic accountants. God help them and us.


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## doncrozier (Jun 17, 2022)

The MBAs took over from the engineers and there are no signs that anything will change, sadly. Every company has to keep an eye on the bottom line, but the 737Max tragedy is a clear example of that culture going too far.


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## Dakota 400 (Jun 17, 2022)

JWM said:


> Did it really save Boeing anything by trying for non-union assembly people in S.C. when there was zero educational and experience background in aircraft assembly? This member of this forum thinks not. The problem is dimwit executives and myopic accountants. God help them and us.



As a Boeing shareholder and flies on both Boeing and Airbus planes, I completely agree with your post. Have not flown on all models of either company's planes, but I prefer some of the Airbus planes when compared to a similar model of a Boeing plane.




doncrozier said:


> The MBAs took over from the engineers and there are no signs that anything will change, sadly. Every company has to keep an eye on the bottom line, but the 737Max tragedy is a clear example of that culture going too far.



I still have some hope that there may be some positive changes. There has been within the last two years some new Board members elected. The "new blood" may help to re-direct the Company. But, the move of Headquarters to a politically important area doesn't help the engineering issues that the Company has.


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## west point (Jun 17, 2022)

Do notknock Boeing too much. Even with MCAS crashes airbus computers have run more airplanes into ground. Fortunately were not revenue flight except air France (Chance(


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## jis (Jun 17, 2022)

west point said:


> Do notknock Boeing too much. Even with MCAS crashes airbus computers have run more airplanes into ground. Fortunately were not revenue flight except air France (Chance(


At least since 2000, Boeing has been running far ahead of Airbus in that department :









List of Boeing aircraft accidents


Boeing - List of accidents involving airplane manufactured by Boeing since year 2000 : the list gives access to the events analysis, reports and photos.




www.1001crash.com













List of Airbus aircraft accidents


Airbus - List of accidents involving airplane manufactured by Airbus since year 2000 : the list gives access to the events analysis, reports and photos.




www.1001crash.com


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## Devil's Advocate (Jun 17, 2022)

Nothing put the relative strength of Airbus and Boeing into starker relief than the Qatar Airways paint dispute.


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## Dakota 400 (Jun 18, 2022)

west point said:


> Do notknock Boeing too much. Even with MCAS crashes airbus computers have run more airplanes into ground. Fortunately were not revenue flight except air France (Chance(



I think Airbus introduced the "fly by wire" technology as it was called at the time. Initially, there were some accidents that, I think, was attributed to both the technology and the learning of the technology by the pilots. 

The Smithsonian Channel is running a series of programs titled _Air Accidents_ that is very interesting for those who might be interested. It's surprising at the cause of some of them. In one case, a washer was missing in a piece of equipment; the failure of that item led to the accident.


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## Trogdor (Jun 19, 2022)

west point said:


> Do notknock Boeing too much. Even with MCAS crashes airbus computers have run more airplanes into ground. Fortunately were not revenue flight except air France (Chance(



Far, far more planes have crashed because there wasn’t a computer to protect the pilots from themselves, than have crashed specifically because the computer did something it wasn’t supposed to do.

In fact, more planes have crashed because pilots didn’t understand what the computer was designed to do than have crashed because of the computer doing something it wasn’t intended to do.


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## Trogdor (Jun 19, 2022)

Dakota 400 said:


> I think Airbus introduced the "fly by wire" technology as it was called at the time. Initially, there were some accidents that, I think, was attributed to both the technology and the learning of the technology by the pilots.



Airbus was the first to make a _fully_ fly-by-wire commercial plane. The technology had existed and was in use on some military applications long before then, and even had limited commercial applications before Airbus introduced it on the A320.


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## JWM (Jun 21, 2022)

I will try to be objective here. I recently flew from MCO/IAH/EZE (Buenos Aires) and SCL (Santiago)/DFW/MCO. United kicked us out of our Polaris seats because our connector from Orlando was late. Didn't like "Premium Economy", but the plane was much quieter than American's 777 in Flagship Business coming back. However, American's cabin service and crew were far superior. My best flight? June 2019 on Lufthansa FRA-MIA A380 in Business on the Upper Level. The quiet was incredible as was the smooth flight and landing.


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## Rover (Jul 6, 2022)

China's biggest airlines sealed a deal with Airbus to buy almost 300 aircraft worth $37 billion. It's China's biggest aircraft order since COVID-19 dealt a huge blow to the travel industry. But the deal is being called a big disappointment by U.S. manufacturer Boeing, who had received intentions from China to order 300 aircraft from them. Then the 737Max issues happened...


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## Devil's Advocate (Jul 6, 2022)

Rover said:


> Then the 737Max issues happened...


Boeing and Southwest Airlines courted disaster in pursuit of cheaper profits with predictable results. There are no surprises that a combination of screwing up, covering it up, and deflecting all blame before being caught has alarmed many potential customers. The main factor that is keeping _McBoeing Douglas_ relevant outside of the US is that Airbus does not possess unlimited manufacturing capability. As a result some airlines will need mainline commercial aircraft long before Airbus can deliver them and Boeing will be the only major aircraft supplier available to take those orders.


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## jis (Jul 6, 2022)

Several reports in industry rags seem to suggest that Boeing is also about to lose a $10 Billion Malaysian order for a number of wide bodies, to Airbus.


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## jis (Jul 12, 2022)

At last some good news for Boeing... ANA finalizes order






ANA HOLDINGS Reaches Agreement with Boeing for Advanced Passenger and Cargo Aircraft | Press Release | ANA Group Corp.'s Information


【ANA Group Corp.'s Information】he ANA Group's CSR activities that help to maintain the trust of society.




www.anahd.co.jp


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## jis (Jul 22, 2022)

Boeing finally had a good showing at the Farnborough Air Show. In summary it managed to bag the following orders:

100 x 737-10 for Delta
30 x 737-8200 for 777 Partners
25 x 737-10 for Qatar
5 x 787-9 for Aercap

Good showing with the MAX but rather light on the wide-body side.

However, this is not the final list.


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