This is really interesting
http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnf ... _top+story
I always felt it was insane for Boeing to count on single source of structural portions of the 787 (wings and wing boxes). If you are going to do that, you need to have two sources, not one (or do it in house and while it may take a while, you will get it done and done right).
Embraer took wings back due to those same issues.
So, 787, outstanding visionary product with a terrific business case (not model).
So, 787, a dud with the model. While the upfront costs looked good, it costs you more to supervise people all over the planet than it does to do in house, not to mention you don't catch the screw up as fast.
Boeing Changing Plans
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Re: Boeing Changing Plans
Learning never stops, the desire to learn however does. Good news for all.
Aum Sweet Aum.
Re: Boeing Changing Plans
This is what will be known as the Obama-doctrine.
He anounced he would create millions of jobs.
Here you have it: pull the work back from foreign subcontractors and you have immediately tenthousands of jobs.
Next? The tanker project.
Next?: the JSF projects with foreign assistance.
Next? : all the Ford and GM plants abroad ( oops, sorry, that was not aviation )
He anounced he would create millions of jobs.
Here you have it: pull the work back from foreign subcontractors and you have immediately tenthousands of jobs.
Next? The tanker project.
Next?: the JSF projects with foreign assistance.
Next? : all the Ford and GM plants abroad ( oops, sorry, that was not aviation )
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jan_olieslagers
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Re: Boeing Changing Plans
Apart from the politic issues (which I think correctly assessed by Regi) I see in my job also a return from the ridiculous outsourcing mentality. Back to normal seems to be the motto nowadays, and not before time!
Re: Boeing Changing Plans
Yes Jan, sometimes outsourcing was ridiculous, expensive and contra productive.
But one of the motivations of manufacturing companies to retract subcontracting is to keep its own workforce.
We have to go back in the past to find out why so much work was subcontracted.
First of all , you can not have every manufacturing discipline in your company. So for some activities you are almost obliged to buy it from outside.
Secondly many manufacturing companies found it more expensive to upgrade their manufacturing facilities than to buy it from outside. A dangerous decision that swung back into the bookkeeper's face when the companies were confronted with exploding prices.
Another problem arose 2-3 years ago : capacity. Everything what was big , and heavy got double , triple lead times than a year before.
Another reason was local content. Some countries insist that if you want to sell something in their country, you need to buy a certain persentage of it in their country.
A big problem in Western Europe are the very strict employment rules. It is very diffcult to get rid off personell that yo udon't need anymore. Look what Ford did: they assembled their subcontractors around their manufacturing site at Genk. But all thse employees are not Ford workers, but employed by that subcontractor ( who has just 1 customer: Ford next door )
Another factor was "hubris". Hot shot managers thought it would be easy to get some manufacturing details on USB-sticks, send the machines to a cheap labour country and get the parts 1 month later as they had been made in Sheffield, Lyon or Franfurt. No, it didn't work in many cases because nobody could predict that the new manufacturing site was confronted with energy shortages ( South-Africa, China ), >20 religious holidays ( India), enourmous corruption, even to get a telephone line ( please fill in any nation at free will
), transport problems+theft, export taxes (try to understand that concept !) , new labour laws changing every week, visa problems for the western expatriates, harsh legislation to hire local labourers ( Vietnam ) , the problem of the word "joint venture", which means that you as a foreigner are never boss in your own , the obligations for technology transfer ( China 
), political turmoil and revolutions and wars ( Georgia, where the local aviation company owned by american investors was bombed by the Russians ) , and so on and on and on.
We will see this year a worldwide retraction on the foreign subcontracting market. The first ones who will suffer most will be the companies tin he newly developed countries such as China and India. Companies focused on export, with litlle expertise, narrow customer base, no own products, one specific product.
But let there be no doubt that we in Western Europe will suffer as well.
Solution? Go through it, work hard, innovation, tough guidance of the companies, save money and invest in new brains.
But one of the motivations of manufacturing companies to retract subcontracting is to keep its own workforce.
We have to go back in the past to find out why so much work was subcontracted.
First of all , you can not have every manufacturing discipline in your company. So for some activities you are almost obliged to buy it from outside.
Secondly many manufacturing companies found it more expensive to upgrade their manufacturing facilities than to buy it from outside. A dangerous decision that swung back into the bookkeeper's face when the companies were confronted with exploding prices.
Another problem arose 2-3 years ago : capacity. Everything what was big , and heavy got double , triple lead times than a year before.
Another reason was local content. Some countries insist that if you want to sell something in their country, you need to buy a certain persentage of it in their country.
A big problem in Western Europe are the very strict employment rules. It is very diffcult to get rid off personell that yo udon't need anymore. Look what Ford did: they assembled their subcontractors around their manufacturing site at Genk. But all thse employees are not Ford workers, but employed by that subcontractor ( who has just 1 customer: Ford next door )
Another factor was "hubris". Hot shot managers thought it would be easy to get some manufacturing details on USB-sticks, send the machines to a cheap labour country and get the parts 1 month later as they had been made in Sheffield, Lyon or Franfurt. No, it didn't work in many cases because nobody could predict that the new manufacturing site was confronted with energy shortages ( South-Africa, China ), >20 religious holidays ( India), enourmous corruption, even to get a telephone line ( please fill in any nation at free will
), transport problems+theft, export taxes (try to understand that concept !) , new labour laws changing every week, visa problems for the western expatriates, harsh legislation to hire local labourers ( Vietnam ) , the problem of the word "joint venture", which means that you as a foreigner are never boss in your own , the obligations for technology transfer ( China ), political turmoil and revolutions and wars ( Georgia, where the local aviation company owned by american investors was bombed by the Russians ) , and so on and on and on.We will see this year a worldwide retraction on the foreign subcontracting market. The first ones who will suffer most will be the companies tin he newly developed countries such as China and India. Companies focused on export, with litlle expertise, narrow customer base, no own products, one specific product.
But let there be no doubt that we in Western Europe will suffer as well.
Solution? Go through it, work hard, innovation, tough guidance of the companies, save money and invest in new brains.
Re: Boeing Changing Plans
Sorry for the wrong spelling. I had to write it too quickly with not enough time for checking.