Boeing CEO: New Airplane Design Years Away

Dave Calhoun says his company needs to prioritize digital capabilities first.

Michael Wildes

Monday, June 06, 2022 at 05:14 PM ET

Verified

Boeing says going digital will boost revenue, while eliminating design and production hurdles. [Courtesy: Boeing]

Key Takeaways:

Boeing's CEO stated that a new clean-sheet airliner design is "at least a couple of years" away.
The company is prioritizing significant improvements in its digital design and manufacturing capabilities, including expanded partnerships with cloud providers, to ensure any new aircraft is substantially better.
Boeing is not rushing to compete with rival Airbus, with its CEO arguing that current engine technology doesn't offer sufficient incremental performance benefits to justify a new design.
Future aircraft will require major advancements in sustainability, cockpit design, and autonomy, in addition to improved engine performance, before Boeing considers developing a new platform.

See a mistake? Contact us.

Boeing’s (NYSE: BA) president and CEO Dave Calhoun said any new clean-sheet airliner design would be “at least a couple of years” away. Speaking at a conference for investors recently, the CEO of the aircraft manufacturer said the company needed time to improve its digital capabilities necessary to ensure any potential design would be substantially better.

Improving Digital Capabilities

In a conversation with Bernstein aerospace and defense analyst Doug Harned, Calhoun said that while design teams had progressed privately in testing out the new digital design approaches, more work needed to be done with those tools before any genuine product came.