Leeham News and Analysis
There's more to real news than a news release.
Boeing sees no new single aisle plane until 2040
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By Scott Hamilton
Oct. 27, 2025, © Leeham News: Recent reports that Boeing is working on a new single-aisle aircraft to replace the 737 MAX and a New Midmarket Airplane (NMA), or a version of it, are fundamentally true but vastly overhyped. At a conference in Prague earlier this month, Boeing’s Darren Hulst put a damper on this speculation, but said only that Boeing was “not close” to launching a new airplane.
Concept of the Boeing New Midmarket Aircraft. Credit: Leeham News.
Boeing hasn’t publicly put any dates on entries into service of its new airplanes, whatever these may be. But internally, Boeing is of the belief that its 737 replacement won’t enter service before 2040.
This doesn’t mean that Boeing’s Product Development unit isn’t working on new airplanes in the background. The company must be ready to respond in case some other OEM introduces a new airplane before then.
Airbus’ CEO Guillaume Faury publicly said several times that it will introduce a replacement for the A320neo in 2038. But there are some within Airbus who dispute this, concluding that new technology needed to justify a new airplane won’t be ready until the 2040 decade.
The driving factor is, of course, new engines. But as LNA’s 13-part series about new airplane technology and 7-part series about new production technologies demonstrate, engines aren’t the only technology needed. However, without significant advances in engine technology, none of the others is sufficient to justify a new airplane.
Perspective on Boeing’s 737 replacement
By Scott Hamilton
Sept. 30, 2025, © Leeham News: The Wall Street Journal billed the story as an exclusive, and it did contain details previously unreported.
But the fact that Boeing is working on a 737 replacement isn’t new, even if Boeing has been super-quiet about it. The breadcrumbs have been dropped into public sight all along, and within aviation circles, more has been discussed as well.
Under former CEO David Calhoun, he and other executives discussed the 737 replacement in the form of the transonic truss brace wing (TTBW) single-aisle concept. The very wide, thin wing had about 35 feet of folding wing (as opposed to the folding wing tips on the 777X).
Boeing and Airbus are designing future wings with long folds to allow much greater wingspan than today’s wings. The future folding wings will have a much long fold than the Boeing 777X. Credit: Leeham News.
What Boeing didn’t say publicly, but which was known within aviation circles, was that Boeing was also designing a conventional wing-and-tube 737 replacement in parallel. Boeing always has a Plan A and a Plan B under study, so this was no surprise. But a former 737 program engineer told LNA that Boeing needed a Plan B in this case to serve as a baseline against which the TTBW could be compared for efficiency.
When Calhoun’s successor, Kelly Ortberg, killed the TTBW, Boeing said research and development on the wing would continue. Of course, it would be a replacement for a 737. Why else continue this very specific R&D? Not inconsequentially, Airbus has long been designing a folding wing “Wing of Tomorrow” for the A320 replacement.
Furthermore, the underlying research into the TTBW’s fuselage and systems may be applied to a new airplane, just as elements of the Sonic Cruiser made their way into the 787 in the early 2000s.
What’s the next new aircraft, Part 4
By Bjorn Fehrm
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July 28, 2025, © Leeham News: In Part 4 of our five-part series on examining the potential next generation of aircraft in the coming decades, we take a closer look at Aircraft 5 to 8 in our Figure 1.
Figure 1. The 13 airliners we look at in the series. Source: Leeham Co.
These are the (5) GE, NASA, and Boeing hybrid airliner, (6) Airbus ZEROe hydrogen airliner, (7) Boeing’s NMA, and (8) the Boeing New Light Twin.
We examine the market for these aircraft, their technological challenges, and their potential future.
To what extent can the A321XLR replace the Boeing 757, Part 3
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By Bjorn Fehrm
July 11, 2024, © Leeham News: We are comparing the Airbus a321XLR to the Boeing 757 to understand to what extent it can replace the 757 on the longer routes it operates for major airlines like United, American, and Delta.
We have looked at the development and operational history of the aircraft, their Apples-to-Apples capacity and range. Now, we use Leeham’s Aircraft Performance and Cost Model (APCM) to compare the operational costs of the aircraft.
Summary:
- The Boeing 757-200 has the same passenger capacity as the A321LR/XLR and a larger cargo capacity.
- Its range can compete with the A321LR but not the XLR. Both beat the 757 on operational economics.
To what extent can the A321XLR replace the Boeing 757, Part 1.
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By Bjorn Fehrm
June 27, 2024, © Leeham News: The Airbus A321XLR, the extra-long-range version of the A321neo, will start operational service with IBERIA on the Madrid-Boston trans-Atlantic route later this year. It’s the type of thin, long-range route the Boeing 757 has served to date.
We will use our Aircraft Performance and Cost model (APCM) to examine to what extent the A321XLR can replace the 757 on world routes. What is the difference in capacity and range, and what improvement in operational economics can be expected?
Summary:
- The Boeing 757 was the original MOM/NMA (Middle-Of-the-Market / New-Midmarket-Airplane).
- It had unique characteristics, which Boeing would have followed up with the NMA project.
- Boeing hesitated, and Airbus developed the A321XLR to fill this role. Has it succeeded?
Bjorn’s Corner: New aircraft technologies. Part 40. The initial production crisis
By Bjorn Fehrm
December 01, 2023, ©. Leeham News: We are discussing the different phases of an airliner development program. After covering Conceptual, Preliminary, and Detailed design, the manufacturing of prototypes, and their roles in flight tests, we now look at Production.
Last week, we explained why the focus on the production phase has increased for recent and future projects. Now we go deeper into why the production phase and how it runs is so important.
Figure 1. The development plan for a new airliner. Source: Leeham Co.
Calhoun’s moonshot for the Next Boeing Airplane
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Now open for all readers.
By Scott Hamilton
David Calhoun
Sept. 4, 2023, © Leeham News: As people try to figure out when Boeing is going to launch a new airplane, confusion continues over semantics and doubts continue over willingness.
The semantics revolves around the words “launch” and “introduce.”
Brian West, the CFO of The Boeing Co., appears at an investors conference Sept. 7 hosted by Jefferies, an investment bank. The event will be webcast; a link is available on the Boeing website. Perhaps West can clarify the timeline, but here is what’s happened recently.
David Calhoun, the CEO of The Boeing Co., said during Boeing’s investors’ day event on Nov. 2 last year that Boeing will “introduce” a new airplane by the middle of the next decade. LNA at that time asked corporate communications if by “introduce” Calhoun meant entry-into-service or a program launch. Corp Com replied that Calhoun meant EIS.
Last month, at another investors conference, a lower level Boeing official said Boeing would “launch” its next airplane by the middle of the next decade. If this is what the official meant, “launching” the next airplane by mid-next decade would represent a major shift. LNA figured the official was mixing words and asked Corp Com for clarity. A spokesman replied, go with Calhoun’s November statement. So, for the moment, let’s take this at face value.
Then there are the skeptics.
The Economics of the 767 and A330 at Seven and Eight abreast
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By Bjorn Fehrm
Introduction
Dec. 8, 2022, © Leeham News: In a previous article, we started speculating what an NMA type of aircraft would look like based on a Boeing 767 cross-section. An airliner’s cross-section decides the design of a large number of parts in an airplane.
In essence, a fuselage is a tube with a constant cross-section where the constant parts are repeated framewise to form the fuselage. It’s finished with a tapering forward cockpit and a rear tapering empennage.
We now look at what could have been a passenger version of an NMA that would have used the Boeing 767 cross-section with adaptations. To understand its economic impact, we make a comparison where we take a standard 767-300ER, then modify it to an NMA type fuselage and compare it to the competition in the size class, the A330-200 and -800.
As before, we do this by flying the world’s busiest long-haul route, London Heathrow, to New York JFK.
Summary
- An NMA based on an improved 767 fuselage cross-section would have been a very competitive airliner
- I would be the ideal replacement for the Boeing 757, 767, and 787-8.
With Boeing’s decision against new airplanes, Airbus will stand down, too
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By Scott Hamilton
Kiran Rao. Credit: Airborne Capital.
Nov. 14, 2022, © Leeham News: Boeing’s decision to suspend the launch of any new airplane until the middle of the next decade means innovation of any kind from any company is largely dead for the next decade.
Airbus won’t launch a new airplane either, now that Boeing has stood down, says its former chief strategic officer, Kiran Rao. Rao is now an advisor to airlines and lessors. He had been with Airbus for 25 years in sales and product strategy.
While Boeing’s decision to suspend new airplane development casts a dark cloud over its strategic future, Airbus now is going to rest on its own status quo, Rao said.
Summary
- Airbus engineers will atrophy.
- Boeing was “one step away from checkmate” against Airbus in 2005-2006 and made a big mistake not taking up the opportunity.
- GE and Safran don’t want to innovate. Pratt & Whitney can’t do much beyond today.
- Boeing should have launched the NMA. It would have beaten the A321XLR.
- The NMA would have created a new market.
Jump in R&D spending at Boeing Commerical Airplanes points to renewed studies for new airplane
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By Scott Hamilton
Return of the NMA? Photo credit: Leeham News.
Aug. 1, 2022, © Leeham News: Buried in Boeing’s second quarter results released last week was a sharp jump in research and development spending.
It wasn’t just a small increase at Boeing Commercial Airplanes (BCA). Boeing spent more on research and development in the quarter and the half year. Expenses hit $1.33bn for the half-year compared with $996m a year earlier. For the quarter, expenses rose $996m vs $497m. R&D for Commercial Airplanes rose to $693m for the half and $372m for the quarter, compared with $524m and $255m, increases of 32% and 46%, respectively.
Spending is still short of the peak in 2019. But the reduced spending post-grounding of the 737 MAX and the COVID-19 pandemic was reversed in the first six months of this year.