Boeing 767 Case Study

Case: Boeing 767

1. According to the case, there are two choices to convert three-crew cockpit to two-crew cockpit: 1. Completion of production and subsequent modification 2. Modification during production. Considering about the advantages and risks about these two method, in my opinion, modification during production will be better. If they modify the plan after production, the potential "loss of configuration" risk will exist. Meanwhile, if the work was done not very carefully, the operating system will be disrupted. That's a serious safety problem. Otherwise, due to the space problem, if fire happened, the impact will be unrecoverable. However, if the modification will be done during production, the risk only will be the disruption of production plan and what they will loss is time and money. The most important thing that the Airlines and passengers concern about is safety of the plane. If the safety problem exist, the impact on the company will be disastrous. Thus, it is better to do the modification during production.

2. In order to capture the trend of the market, Boeing directly talks to the major airline, their primary customers, to get what they need in the future. Owe to this, Boeing can do a complete forecast annually and readjust the forecast quarterly. A good forecast for the market will help Boeing to avoid the risk of competition and occupy the market quickly.

For technology development, Boeing regarded it as an ongoing process. Also, it is divided into different areas and each area has its own chief. As it is said in the case, "When a new plane was proposed, engineers first reviews all existing technology projects to see if any were appropriate." From that, we can see that every development of technology must be examined carefully. It is what Boeing do to avoid technology risk.

And Boeing also has a careful cost definition. Audit teams staffed by experienced Boeing managers works during the program definition phase. Parametric estimates was used to estimate the cost of what will happen during the production. It helps to control the finance risk.

3. In October 1990, Boeing started the 777 program. In order to know the needs of the customers in the market, Boeing began a plan named "Working Together". Boeing gathered some airline company to sit together and talked about the new plane. It means that Boeing can improve the shortage of the old planes, even the shortage of the planes built by its competitor. With the help of the engineers and different airline company, Boeing started to produce the 777. Under the good technology development, the new 777 used a lot of new technologies such as CATIA (Computer-aided Three-dimensional Interactive Application). Due to the advanced technology, the cost of the plane also went down, though Boeing still need order lots of parts from other companies. Also, the 787, which is called