Boeing 787 Dreamliner - Mark Wagner [25]
The 7E7 was deliberately “standardized” to cut costs for airlines, make it easier to finance and build. By making about $10 million of optional features basic, such as head-up displays and heaviest maximum takeoff option, Boeing predicted that the 7E7 would be more attractive to increasingly influential airline alliance groups such as OneWorld, Sky Team, and the Star Alliance. Customer members of the Star Alliance, whose logos are painted along the side of this BMI Airbus A321, would have around only about 150 catalog options to choose from on the 7E7 versus some 600 on the 777. Mark Wagner
“The alliances can be a powerful instrument toward standardization,” said 7E7 Vice President for Customers John Feren. “We only have one landing gear supplier, and our current plan is for two engine suppliers. We are also looking at going from fifteen LRUs [line replaceable units] to eight in the cockpit, for example. The affordability of this aircraft will be as important as its fuel efficiency, and if we don’t price it competitively, all the innovations will be for naught.”
Speaking for one of the prospective customers, Cathay Pacific, the Hong Kong–based carrier’s U.S. Technical Vice President Peter Gardner confirmed “everything forward of the flight deck door is virtually standard. The only thing that’s left for the customers to mess with is the interior, and apart from the exterior paint and the engine selection, it is being narrowed down.” Gardner also gave one of the first public reactions to the cabin mock-up, also just unveiled. “There is a ‘wow’ factor as you go through the door. It creates a new ambience, but the concept is really good.”
But it was the structural supplier news that really hit the headlines. Although it was widely known that much more of the aircraft would be made by partners, it was the scale and the type of work that still took the outside world by surprise. Some 65 percent of the aircraft would be made by outside companies, with Japan securing the largest chunk, including the wingbox—the first Boeing wing to be made offshore. Just as surprising was the unexpected teaming of two longtime Boeing structural partners and teammates, Alenia of Italy and U.S.-based Vought. The two even formed a new company, Global Aeronautica, which would be responsible for the center and aft fuselages and aft stabilizer.
The U.S.-Italian venture was as strategic as it was unexpected. David Brigante, Alenia vice president in charge of commercial aviation accounts, believed the new relationship with Vought was vital, not only to the 7E7, but also to Alenia’s longer-term growth ambitions. Before its tie-up with the American company, Alenia had looked at opening its own U.S. site. “We always had the idea of having an assembly area near the customer,” said Brigante, who added it even considered buying a part of Vought from Northrop Grumman. “That’s how it all started.”
Across the Atlantic in Charleston, South Carolina, Alenia North America Chief Operating Officer and Global Aeronautica Board of Managers Chairman Vincenzo Caiazzo said the joint venture “combines the best of the two companies to perform activities that previously were not performed by either. The investment has also allowed a foreign company to have access to a global market—a move which is important for both Alenia and Vought. The 7E7 is all about the creation of innovative relationships in the supply chain that have never happened before—that’s why Global Aeronautica will be really remembered as a pioneer.”
Caiazzo added, “The new business model of the Dreamliner has dramatically changed the