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Did a 1997 merger ruin Boeing?

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Re: Did a 1997 merger ruin Boeing?

#291

Post by drtgh »

missedthecue wrote: post #221
inferiorhuman wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

China spent ~15 years developing the C919, and it's finally entering mass production. But it also appears to be sold out until the 2030s. ahahahahahahahahahahah no. Since 2022 Comac has delivered a grand total of four C919s. The only non-Chinese airline to order any is owned by a rich Chinese guy. The rest are Chinese airlines that have been browbeaten into ordering some. Nobody outside of China is in any rush to ord…

True on all counts but it probably won't be long until it sells well. The Chinese government is throwing a lot of money behind it and even if the US doesn't certify it for political reasons, there is a huge global market starving for fresh air frames.

I think would not be exactly political. The part where the plutocracy benefits the interests of a few pockets would certainly be political, but by other part, the major aircraft manufacturers in the EU and the UE, build civil aircraft as well as military ones.

As I understand it, to torpedo these companies by dumping prices would be to indirectly torpedo the EU's and the UE's defense aircraft production. A cost based production battle would be never won against China. And I guess many taxes would be earmarked to counteract this, again.

By other side, the rampant lack of quality in Chinese products and the inability to produce enough planes if they were contracted, in my guess would translate into the quick construction of factories with the worst production quality yet to be seen, for to feed the dumping.

The matter is, in such scenario we as consumers would be deeply affected, as civil aircraft manufacturing is already at the limit of what can be done without compromising safety (seriously, some managers should have been fired a few years ago, The aim should not be to imitate the lack-quality of the Chinese industry).

I don't want to think about what would happen if a race to cut manufacturing costs were endemically launched in the civil aircraft sector. As European I don't want to see it. If it were, lets say, the Japanese industry, the high quality one, not the one that is offshoring production to China, I wouldn't be worried about it or comment on it.

This is mere guessing, I'm not in the sector (It would be interesting to find objective researches on this matter in fact).

Re: Did a 1997 merger ruin Boeing?

#292

Post by PontifexMinimus »

moose_man wrote: post #22
skyyler wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What can reasonably be done to combat it? Leadership at all the biggest firms is on board with shareholder capitalism. To them, Welch style management just means line goes up...

It's going to take a long time, but first is to destroy the myth that corporations have one purpose they need to fulfill: Generate revenue and ensure things are profitable for shareholders. This myth artificially took root in the 1970s. Business schools have to stop teaching this.

Changing what is taught in business schools will make little difference. You have to change what incentives operate on people.

Re: Did a 1997 merger ruin Boeing?

#293

Post by bloomingeek »

Xixi wrote: post #244
bloomingeek wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm retired from American Airlines. AA had eight different Boeing planes, plus a few Airbuses thirty years ago. By the time I retired last year, most of the different planes are gone and AA mostly focuses on 737, 777 and 787, with a few misc planes on the chopping block in the future. Fuel usage, mechanic training and parts inventory are the reasons for the changes.

"a few misc planes on the chopping block in the future" sounds somewhat disingenuous: we are talking of a fleet of 477 Airbus A320s [1] (family, mostly A319s and A321s), nearly 50% of American Airlines entire fleet. This includes 80 A321 NEO, and with a further order for 50 A321XLRs I strongly doubt these are on the chopping block. The A321 NEO is very hard to beat on transcon: AA needs the subtype, so it's here to s…

Which is basically what I wrote.

Re: Did a 1997 merger ruin Boeing?

#294

Post by naasking »

idiotsecant wrote: post #235
naasking wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> an engineer-led culture made it more difficult to compete in a cost sensitive environment. I know this is a common sentiment, but I don't quite get it. Engineering is often about optimizing multivariate functions, and cost is just another variable to optimize. If you frame it properly to engineers, they can solve cost problems too.

Given the choice between cost optimized and safe, fast, cool, etc very few engineers are going to go for cost savings. If there's no bean counters in charge and no market cnstraints its obvious that the product is going to be really good and really expensive.

> If there's [...] no market cnstraints its obvious that the product is going to be really good and really expensive.

Well sure, you literally just removed the cost optimization variable. SpaceX vs. NASA is a clear example demonstrating that engineers can do this sort of optimization when it's given to them as a constraint. NASA's rocket designs were all custom, single-use, often down to the bolts because the budget was per-project/launch, where SpaceX rockets were designed for reuse and cost minimization across multiple launches.

Re: Did a 1997 merger ruin Boeing?

#295

Post by throw0101d »

naasking wrote: post #229
stg22 wrote: post #140

The role of McDonnell-Douglas is exaggerated. Boeing had achieved pretty close to a monopoly in the mid-1970s, but things had changed by the mid-1990s. 1. Domestic airlines protected by regulation had been effective monopolies and Boeing's engineer-led culture thrived in an environment where airlines didn't care about costs. But that environment died with airline deregulation in 1978 and an engineer-led culture made…

> an engineer-led culture made it more difficult to compete in a cost sensitive environment. I know this is a common sentiment, but I don't quite get it. Engineering is often about optimizing multivariate functions, and cost is just another variable to optimize. If you frame it properly to engineers, they can solve cost problems too.

> If you frame it properly to engineers, they can solve cost problems too.

In eng school there was a saying: An engineer is someone who can build something for $4 that any fool can build for $7.

Re: Did a 1997 merger ruin Boeing?

#296

Post by rainbowzootsuit »

idiotsecant wrote: post #235
naasking wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> an engineer-led culture made it more difficult to compete in a cost sensitive environment. I know this is a common sentiment, but I don't quite get it. Engineering is often about optimizing multivariate functions, and cost is just another variable to optimize. If you frame it properly to engineers, they can solve cost problems too.

Given the choice between cost optimized and safe, fast, cool, etc very few engineers are going to go for cost savings. If there's no bean counters in charge and no market cnstraints its obvious that the product is going to be really good and really expensive.

Minimum Flyable Plane

Re: Did a 1997 merger ruin Boeing?

#297

Post by AniseAbyss »

jjeaff wrote: post #271
KennyBlanken wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's wild is that all this happened even with the NSA conducting industrial espionage on Airbus on behalf of Boeing and M-D.

I don't think secret tech or cloak and dagger business moves are what makes an aircraft company win. it's a far more complex amalgamation of government intervention, regulations, institutional knowledge, and company culture. Things you could never steal with spies.

European countries have had aviation industries stretching back to the 1910s. They always had the engineering. But making a good product is not enough. You have to SELL it.

No what made Airbus start winning in the 1980s was hiring a former Boeing salesman. That's when they took off. Convincing air liners to take a chance and order Airbus planes.

Re: Did a 1997 merger ruin Boeing?

#298

Post by naasking »

ks1723 wrote: post #274
naasking wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> an engineer-led culture made it more difficult to compete in a cost sensitive environment. I know this is a common sentiment, but I don't quite get it. Engineering is often about optimizing multivariate functions, and cost is just another variable to optimize. If you frame it properly to engineers, they can solve cost problems too.

This is too simple. For large endeavors (building a plane) it is impossible to formulate all contributions to all quality criteria/cost and constraints into a technical engineering optimization problem. Let alone when re-structuring and optimizing the company organization and processes to build those planes at the same time.

> For large endeavors (building a plane) it is impossible to formulate all contributions to all quality criteria/cost and constraints into a technical engineering optimization problem.

It's obviously possible, SpaceX vs. NASA is an existence proof. Maybe you have something specific in mind when you say "technical engineering optimization problem", like a formula you can minimize mathematically to account for every little contribution, but this often isn't necessary. Like when solving physics problems using approximations, you often only need to minimize the first and second order largest contributors to the cost and you'll be in the right ballpark.

This also means you don't need to find the literally absolute minimum and capture literally all of the contributors to the cost during the design process. And of course this is what happens in the real world already, do you think accountants and pointy haired bosses guiding a bunch of engineers are going to find the absolute minimum? Of course not, they find what looks like a minimum from their limited view of a project after the engineers estimate the costs of producing parts and the labour required. Just close the loop without the accountants and bosses and engineers can do this optimization themselves.

Re: Did a 1997 merger ruin Boeing?

#299

Post by Cacti »

WalterBright wrote: post #209
lovecg wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can’t find anything about that. As far as I can tell, the optional AOA indicator would also include the disagree alert which would tell the pilots something is wrong with the sensors, but that had nothing do to with MCAS per se. They still had no idea there’s this whole new system that uses only one of the sensors and repeatedly trims down. Even after the first crash they only went as far as recommend going through…

> recommend going through the runaway trim procedure The EA crew did not follow the runaway trim procedure sent to them in an Emergency Airworthiness Directive. The procedure is: 1. restore normal trim with the electric trim switches 2. turn off the trim system

amazing how many seem willing to overlook this fact for their narrative

Re: Did a 1997 merger ruin Boeing?

#300

Post by ks1723 »

naasking wrote: post #298
ks1723 wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is too simple. For large endeavors (building a plane) it is impossible to formulate all contributions to all quality criteria/cost and constraints into a technical engineering optimization problem. Let alone when re-structuring and optimizing the company organization and processes to build those planes at the same time.

> For large endeavors (building a plane) it is impossible to formulate all contributions to all quality criteria/cost and constraints into a technical engineering optimization problem. It's obviously possible, SpaceX vs. NASA is an existence proof. Maybe you have something specific in mind when you say "technical engineering optimization problem", like a formula you can minimize mathematically to account for every li…

I agree with you and you basically make the same point as wanted to make: you can’t just frame it as an engineering problem, it involves accountants and bosses. So your original statement „If you frame it properly to engineers, they can solve cost problems too.“ is too simplistic in my view.
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