Boeing Lands $1.1-Billion Order for 21 New Jets
Boeing Co. had a bumpy landing Monday at the year’s biggest air show, offering up a blunt assessment of costly problems and a management shake-up before announcing orders for 21 new jets with a list price of $1.1 billion.
Boeing said it would improve its performance after company President Harry Stonecipher acknowledged, “we’ve let down many commercial airplane customers” with late deliveries.
“Where we have been too arrogant, too distracted or too self-satisfied, we are going to be much more intense and much more focused on things that really matter,” Stonecipher said at a news conference at the annual Farnborough International show. “I am speaking here of satisfying the customer in every way.”
Stonecipher wound up fielding his first public questions about the recent firing of Ron Woodard as president of Boeing’s Commercial Airplane Group. Woodard was replaced by Boeing executive Alan Mulally, who was not at the air show because of what Boeing called a previous personal commitment.
Stonecipher said Boeing had only itself to blame for its problems--which have cost the company about $3 billion--and predicted executive bonuses would be lower as a result.
Shares of Seattle-based Boeing closed down 63 cents Friday, at $33.94 on the New York Stock Exchange. Its stock hit a 52-week low of $29 last week.
But the company tried to put a better spin on things, announcing the first big batch of orders at the Farnborough show. Archrival Airbus Industrie promised to announce its own new orders later.
Boeing said International Lease Finance Corp. has ordered 17 new jets with a list price of around $900 million, including nine 737-800s, six 757-200s, one 767-300ER and one 777-200ER. ILFC, based in Los Angeles, purchases jets that it then leases to air carriers.
Boeing also said KLM Royal Dutch Airlines ordered four new 737-900s with a list price of $200 million.
Airbus, the airplane-making consortium from Britain, France, Germany and Spain, said it was raising its list prices by 3%, following the announcement in July that Boeing would raise catalog prices by 5%.
