Dave Calhoun, Chairman of Boeing.
Adam Jeffery | CNBC
Boeing‘s new CEO Dave Calhoun said Wednesday that he wants the company to resume production of the 737 Max months before regulators sign off on the planes and airlines prepare to return them to service.
Boeing suspended production of the planes this month because a worldwide grounding of the jetliners after two fatal crashes lasted months longer than expected. The production shutdown has already cost thousands of jobs and raised concerns about the crisis’ impact on the broader economy.
But Calhoun’s comments indicate the company does not expect the production pause to last more than a few months.
“We got to get that line started up again,” he said on a conference call with reporters. “And the supply chain will be reinvigorated even before that.”
The 737 Max crisis has rippled through Boeing’s supply chain, which includes General Electric and Spirit AeroSystems, and raised concerns it could hit the broader economy. Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin earlier this month estimated that the issues stemming from the plane’s grounding could shave half a percentage point off U.S. economic growth this year.
Wichita-Kan.-based Spirit AeroSystems, on Jan. 10 announced it would cut an initial 2,800 jobs at one of its biggest suppliers. Boeing this week said it does not expect to lay off or furlough its own employees because of the halt in production.
Calhoun, a decade-long Boeing board member who took the helm of the manufacturer last week, is tasked with steadying the company, shaken by the 737 Max upheaval.
Internal emails that were recently made public revealed employees boasted about bullying regulators into accepting less time-consuming pilot training before officials allowed Boeing to deliver the planes to airlines. In other messages, Boeing employees expressed safety concerns about the plane
A flight-control system Boeing included in the jets was implicated in the two Max crashes — a Lion Air flight in October 2018 and an Ethiopian Airlines flight less than five months later — which killed all 346 people on board. Boeing is now scrambling to get regulators to sign off on changes to that software and other fixes to the plane.
