Boeing 787 Dreamliner - Mark Wagner [17]
“Now we need to sit down with the airlines and talk about the value of speed,” said Gillette. But this was where the impact of 9/11 was already having a profound effect. Bunkered down in survival mode, particularly in the United States and Europe, the airlines could not spare people to work with Boeing on its studies. It therefore focused on other critical aspects, including the establishment of an entirely new production system that would prove both foundational and critically challenging for the 787 project.
Through late 2001 Boeing worked to form what it described as a “technology team” that would form the basis for its future structures and systems partnerships. By the end of January 2002, the process was making headway, with Boeing announcing that the initial rounds of team selection would be complete by the middle of that year. Within days of this statement, Boeing and Japan Aircraft Development (JADE) and its associated Japan Aircraft Industries (JAI) agreed on research and development for the Sonic Cruiser, marking the first formal deal on the project between the airframer and any third party. Jeff Luckey, then director of supplier management for the Sonic Cruiser, predicted similar deals would be struck “at a rapid pace in the months ahead.”
The JAI deal was centered on advanced composite technology, a national strength honed over the years since the 7J7 (see chapter 4), and was backed by aerospace R&D funding from Japan’s trade and industry ministry. Boeing knew that the deal’s importance went beyond technology and the downstream marketing benefits. The JAI consortium had turned to Boeing’s project in 2001, having rejected an offer from Airbus to join the A380 team, and the strategic value of tying up similar agreements with other technology-capable partners around the world was not lost on the company.
Embraer’s “E-Jet” family intrigued Boeing as it searched for game-changing improvements for the design, development, and production of its new aircraft. In 2001 product development teams were dispatched to find out how systems and structural partners helped the Brazilian manufacturer develop its highly successful new, small jet airliners, including the E170/175 and the E190/195. Here the fourth E170 development aircraft banks away from the camera ship during an air-to-air sortie over Brazil. Mark Wagner
Within the systems world, a similar process was under way, with a few added wrinkles. Although the new composites technology meant only a few specific companies around the world would even be capable of joining the Sonic Cruiser team in the first place, the wider breadth of systems expertise meant a greater choice of not only suppliers but also technology. To ease its way through this conundrum, Boeing hit on the idea of asking as many first- and second-tier companies as possible to study the various systems requirements of the new aircraft. The companies would then be asked to forge partnerships between themselves to offer optimized “system solutions.”
By April 2002 Boeing had welcomed fifteen airlines back to its studies and had completed the initial network analysis work required to put a value on speed. This, in turn, had helped define the optimum capacity of the new family at between 190 seats in mostly premium seating and mixed configurations seating up to 250. By now talks with airlines had resumed on a one-to-one basis, mostly because the 777 “working together” model did not apply so readily to the very different Sonic Cruiser. “With a new type of airplane like this, there is more competition between them on how they might use it,” said Walt Gillette. Overall performance, configuration, and specifications remained the subjects for discussions with all the airlines.
“Talks