Yeah, economics are important and all, but I just figured in PRESENT_YEAR aerospace would be a little further along than stapling seats into the back of a pre-existing product that moseys along at .84
"back when I was a kid, we had supersonic transport category airplanes"
No different then your previous company continuously buying aircraft from the 1960-70's era rather than buying new planes that will last them longer into the future and with better economics.
Not so well. Last year they had 2 new orders. I know they have gotten 4 orders this year, not sure if there have been any more, but I don't think so. The last I looked, they had a total of 51 orders with 39 delivered.(pax version)
The freighter orders I believe were a total of 74 with 63 delivered.
They are currently only producing 6 planes a year. I don't think this bodes well for future sales at this point. Tells me Boeing doesn't see/believe it either.
They have dropped the rate down with the intent to get through the trough period that the cargo industry is currently experiencing. There is still a little bit of light at the end of the tunnel.
As to the whole "Boeing not being innovative anymore" theme that has been going on in this thread... I don't think this is true nor would it really be Boeing's fault if it was.
If you look at the industry as a whole, it has completely changed in the last 10-20 years. Back in the day, Airlines BOUGHT their planes, paid them off if financed and operated them to the end of their useful life. Planes were on a 20-40 year useful life cycle with operators, with many planes being operated by just one or two airlines their entire life.
After 9-11 when the industry went into a big downhill spiral, you saw almost all of the airlines dump their oldest fleets. All of the 727's, DC-10's, L-1011's, Classic 747's, Most DC-9's and a few others were retired from passenger service in the 2000-2004 timeframe.
Also around this time and around the world, new low cost airlines began popping up and ordering large fleets of narrow body aircraft. This lead both manufacturers to continuously increase production rate on them. HOWEVER, these new planes were mostly acquired on Short to mid term LEASES, anywhere from 8-12 years roughly. So instead of a plane lasting 20-40 years with one or two airlines, they are now being retired around a decade old. But these planes have to be replaced by new builds for that airline to continue, so the airlines buys more of the same planes.
So how did this affect Boeing and Airbus? When leasing the planes became the major procurement method, the fleet cycle rates changed from 25+ years to under 10. So now, instead of having large technological leapfrogging events from one model to the next, we now have this cycle of continuously upgrading planes with current (well a few years old) technology.
But it doesn't stop there because we have at least three tiers of airlines operating around the world. In the past, your first tier airlines bought the newest planes. The planes being replaced would then be picked up by second tier airlines or if they were really old would go straight to the third world airlines. But because of the leasing model many airlines adopted, now third world airlines are able to get realitively new aircraft sooner. So now, instead of planes being operated to their end of useful life, they are only being operated to their end of Economic life because the leasing companies have to somewhat keep supply down.
Remember, Boeing wanted to go down the all new narrowbody road until American forced their hand...
The whole leasing model is not just subject to LCCs or narrow bodies either. Emirates owns either a single A380 or the entire fleet is leased, I can not remember. Their 777 fleet is very similar.
The 777-X family is still a great plane and can do more than what the A350 can in terms of performance and lifting capability, hence why Airbus is looking at an A350-1100. A -10 would allow them to begin encroaching into A380 territory for a relatively cheap RD cost especially if they can get the plane certified in the early 2020's right after the -8/9 enter service, because remember Emirates fleet is leased. Their first A380's begin coming off of lease next year and Airbus has said they are not willing to do an A380NEO at this time.
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