The Boeing Company (NYSE: BA) has announced its fourth delay in delivering its first of nearly 900 unit order backlog of its 787 Dreamliner from the original May 2008 to the current first quarter 2010. After parts problems and an eight week machinists strike, this does not come as a surprise but many customers are probably wondering whether there will be more delays in the future. Unfortunately, it is unclear whether Boeing has learned enough from these delays to keep them from happening in the future.

If a study by Boeing competitor, Airbus, is to be believed, the 787 has been plagued by a wide range of management problems. The study suggests that when Boeing outsourced a significant portion of the 787's design and assembly integration, it failed in overseeing those partners. Airbus's study suggests that Boeing should have known about the following six problems:

• Its partners' factory workers lacked the skill to do their jobs - The study claims that these workers were "low-wage, trained-on-the-job workers that had no previous aerospace experience."
• Some of its partners lacked design staff - The study claims that one of its partners, Vought, "had no engineering department when selected" by Boeing.
• Some of its suppliers could not produce enough parts - The study claims there was "insufficient supply of frame, clips brackets and floor beams."

Continue reading Is Boeing's fourth 787 delay its last?

Is Boeing's fourth 787 delay its last? originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Thu, 11 Dec 2008 11:56:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Continue reading Airport back-ups: Airlines lose revenues, customers lose patience

Airport back-ups: Airlines lose revenues, customers lose patience originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Wed, 11 Jul 2007 14:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

There have been rumors circulating around the blogosphere, which have reached the Street that Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) might have to delay the release of the iPhone from June to October and the Leopard operating system, already delayed to October, delayed again until January. Apple's PR department has reiterated to the mongers that all is still on schedule.

Okay, great, but then this begs the question, "What if?'" What if Apple did have to delay the launch of these products, especially the iPhone? The reasons would have to be known as they would ascertain the ultimate and proper release date. Is it component sourcing that is an issue? Is it a software-quality issue? Did the beta-testing units developed a few glitches? The reasons would be put into one of two camps: Can Apple control the issue, or is the issue out of Apple's control?

If the iPhone is delayed, what happens to the stock short-term and to the earnings model? The stock would take a hit to be sure, as it did today when the rumors reached traders, before the retraction. Usually this is a situation of shoot first, ask questions later and indeed AAPL plunged to $103.42 (down 2.7%) today on the news.

Update: The iPhone release date of June 29 has been confirmed as of June 3, 2007.

Continue reading Apple iPhone delay snafu: So what if it were true?

Apple iPhone delay snafu: So what if it were true? originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Wed, 16 May 2007 14:21:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

JetBlue catching up to airline industry -- a bad sign originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Tue, 20 Feb 2007 07:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Taiwan PC makers report new delays in the RTM (release to manufacturing) version of Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT)'s Vista, which they were supposed to get this week. Manufacturers are now being told it will be at least mid-November before that release. The reason: more bugs were found that could paralyze an upgrade to a Vista-capable Windows XP OS, according to a story in today's DigiTimes Systems.

The RTM build 5824 was scheduled for release this week, after the number of bugs found in the Windows Vista Release Candidate 2 (RC2) version dropped from 1,450 to around 500, according to sources quoted in the DigiTimes story, but additional bugs that could paralyze an upgraded Vista-capable Windows XP OS halted those plans. The new build is now RTM build 5840 and Microsoft promised to continue to test the new version until its release in November.

Even though Microsoft alerted PC makers to the delay, it assured them that it still planned to launch the business-use and home-use Vista OS by November 2006 and January 2007, respectively.

Now in addition to fears that Vista may block your security programs from being fully functional, you may find that an upgrade locks up your Vista-capable Windows XP OS. You may not want to jump to upgrade until you're sure all these kinks have been worked out.

More bugs and delays for Microsoft's Vista originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Wed, 25 Oct 2006 09:20:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.