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The year started rough for America’s iconic sky-conquering corporation:
- Missing bolts caused a panel to blow out of a Boeing 737 Max in January, forcing the Alaska Airlines flight to complete an emergency landing with a gaping hole in its fuselage.
- Multiple federal agencies investigated the planemaker. Separately, it pleaded guilty to fraud conspiracy after the Justice Department accused it of violating its plea deal in a criminal case over two fatal 737 Max crashes in 2018 and 2019.
The accumulating troubles got then-CEO Dave Calhoun, who was brought in after the crashes to engineer a turnaround, heading for the exit. He announced in March that he would step down by year’s end. Then, in June, Boeing’s space business suffered its own humiliations: Its Starliner capsule malfunctioned in orbit with two astronauts aboard, leaving them without a way to return to Earth from the International Space Station until at least March 2025.
Calhoun was out, and new CEO Kelly Ortberg (who spent decades working for a key Boeing supplier) was installed in August. Less than a month after he got his keycard, though, Boeing machinists launched a strike that extended for seven weeks and halted much of its plane production. This left the company with a net loss north of $6 billion in Q3.
Pulling out of the nosedive
Ortberg recently presented a turnaround plan involving enhanced quality control and more hands-on leadership:
- The CEO chose to work out of Boeing’s Seattle office rather than its Chicago HQ to be closer to production lines in Washington state.
- He also grounded much of Boeing’s corporate jet fleet, telling executives to fly commercial economy to help quell the company’s cash bleed.
In 2025, he’ll need to ramp up 737 Max output, shore up Boeing’s finances, and reform its operational culture—all under a regulatory microscope.—SK
