My two cents, and it's difficult to explain, but there has been a serious cultural change going on at Boeing since Muilenburg took over. Things were shifting before, and realigning but it's very different and apparent now. And there are changes, shuffling, cut backs and examinations happening at every level in every department. There have been a fair amount of lay-offs here and there and there is an uncertainty that is being felt by many employees. More layoffs were announced just a few months ago in the commercial division which will take place over the next several months. I will not be surprised to hear/see that they will be lightening the load in their defense divisions at some point. They lost the new bomber contract. In fact, their entire defense program is having issues and has been for a while. Lockheed snagged over twice the dollar amount in defense contracts last year than Boeing did. Not good.
Boeing has a terrible back log of aircraft that is costing them a fortune in current and new orders. So when they come out and announce that they are going to produce 3 more 777's a month, one has to ponder how this is really going to make the type of impact that they need to be making. How they plan to overcome this back log, I have no idea.
There were a lot of shall we say added value items that used to be provided by Boeing to it's commercial customers which have been either slashed, greatly reduced or farmed out to sub contractors. There is a sure and steady march to look at all their programs and cut expenditures. On many levels, they have been struggling. I am sorry to see this myself, but it's been going on for a few years now. There have been some pretty serious lags in Boeing to recognizing where the commercial industry is headed and what they will need in terms of aircraft into the future. They have now come across as not the innovators that they once were. There have been so many delays in them defining, presenting and claiming new products, and this has also heavily cost them.
There has also been a widening gap between the commercial and the defense side of production and development that needs to be bridged. It is of no help whatsoever that their new KC-46 tanker is going to miss it's contractual deadline for the AF due to the same ongoing re-fueling system issues that has plagued them for some time now and still have yet to be resolved. Muilenburg has been at Boeing a long damn time in other capacities. It will be interesting to see how this all plays out. He is in a serious trim the dollar mode. They had two share buy backs last year. I know that many at Boeing and I mean long term senior employees in engineering for example, are feeling very uncertain and not as hopeful/secure as they would want/like to be. Either he will turn this ship around or he won't. Only time will tell and sadly time is not exactly on their side right now.