Leeham News and Analysis
There's more to real news than a news release.
Pontifications: Deliveries matter, so do orders
By Scott Hamilton
Jan. 11, 2015, © Leeham Co.: Boeing out-delivered Airbus last year by a wide margin. Airbus obtained more orders than Boeing by a wide margin.
Behind our paywall today, we look at some of the reasons for this as we update our annual production forecast. The principal reason Boeing out-delivered Airbus is that production for the 787 is going full blast and production for the A350 is only beginning to ramp up. By 2018, we forecast Airbus will slightly surpass Boeing in production and therefore deliveries.
With Boeing trailing Airbus dramatically for orders this year, an old refrain has resurfaced from years ago when Airbus began outselling Boeing. Phil Condit, then the CEO of Boeing, dismissed the Airbus gains by saying orders don’t matter, only deliveries matter. There have been a few similar statements in recent times.
Bjorn’s Corner: What did we learn in 2015?
By Bjorn Fehrm
08 January 2016, ©. Leeham Co: It’s the first Corner for the year and a look at 2015 as a year of technology advancements is due. 2015 will be remembered as the year when three clean sheet airliners passed important milestones. This will not happen for many years to come, so it will be worth to look at what they brought to world of aviation.
I’m thinking of Bombardier’s (BBD) CSeries getting certification for its first variant; the Mitsubishi MRJ doing its first flight’ and COMAC’s C919 being rolled out. Going forward, we will only have derivatives progressing through such milestones for years except for the roll-out of United Aircraft’s MS-21 single aisle airliner in 2016.
The Airbus A320neo was certified in 2015 and Boeing’s 737 MAX rolled out, but these are derivatives of in-service aircraft.
Embraer’s E-Jet E2 will roll out in February but this is a further development of today’s E-jet and Airbus A350-1000 is a variant of the in-service A350-900.
It will be a long time before we see so much new in a year, so it can be instructive to look at to what extent did these new aircraft bring the state of the art of airliners forward.
Boeing delivers 762 airliners, gets 768 orders in 2015
Jan. 7, 2015: Boeing racked up 762 airliner deliveries last year, a record, while booking 768 orders–a book:bill of fractionally over 1:1.
Boeing throughout the year had largely guided a book:bill of slightly better or slightly lower than one.
The company delivered 495 737s, an equivalent rate of 41.25/mo. There were 18 747-8 deliveries, matching the monthly production rate of 1.5/mo. There were 16 767-300ERs delivered, matching the production rate, and 98 777s, slightly fewer than the equivalent 99.6 annual production rate.
How good is a used 767-300ER? Part 4
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By Bjorn Fehrm
Introduction
Jan. 6 2016, ©. Leeham Co: We now finish our series of acquiring a used Boeing 767 aircraft to upgrade a Boeing 757-based long haul service. The 767 went out of favor recently as it has higher fuel consumption per seat than competing aircraft like Airbus A330-200.
With today’s low fuel prices and favorable used prices, a well kept 767-300ER is once again an interesting long haul aircraft. In previous articles, we looked at different aspects of the 767-300ER compared with the A330-200. First we compared the aircraft’s characteristics (Part one), then Cash Operating Costs (Part two) and finally Direct Operating Costs (Part three).
We now finish the series with a revenue and margin analysis. First we establish the competitor’s payload carrying capabilities over a trans-Atlantic network. Then we calculate their revenue capabilities using standard yields (revenue per load unit). The revenue and cost data then gives us the operating margins for the aircraft.
Summary
- The 757 has the lowest costs but is considerably more limited in its payload and range capability than the 767 and A330. Its lack in capacity is augmented by a lack of cargo handling facilities.
- The 767 has a cargo handling concept, unfortunately with the wrong container standard, LD2. The alternative is pallet based freight, which works well for the 767.
- The A330-200 has the best passenger and cargo transporting capability. This compensates for its higher Direct Operating Costs but the low fuel prices keeps the 767 in the hunt.
FedEx commitments for 777F not new
Jan. 5, 2015: Last year ended with stories that FedEx had commitments for 16 Boeing 777Fs. The reports concluded that this was a new deal.
It’s not.
This story, published Dec. 31, neatly summed up the report and included a comment from FedEx that these commitments have been listed in documents since August.
This did prompt us to take a dive into FedEx and Boeing documents and information to try and sort out some of the confusion. Here’s what we found:
How good is a used 767-300ER? Part 3
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By Bjorn Fehrm
Introduction
Jan. 4 2016, ©. Leeham Co: Before Christmas we started our Boeing 767-300ER article series around acquiring used twin-aisle 767 aircraft to upgrade Boeing 757-based long haul services. We compared the aircraft’s base characteristics in Part One and then their Cash Operating Cost (COC) in Part Two.
Now we continue by analyzing the Direct Operating Cost (DOC) of the aircraft. This adds capital costs to the other operating costs for the aircraft. As the reason for our renewed interest in the 767-300ER is the attractive prices on the used market combined with low fuel prices, the capital costs are an important part of the overall understanding of the costs for the aircraft.
In our assumptions, the 767 is bought as a 10 year old aircraft and then refurbished. It is then operated on a six year financial lease, as is our 757 that we replace. Our benchmark aircraft, the Airbus A330-200 flying in a mainline airline, was bought new in 2009 and is operated on a 10 year financial lease.
Summary
- The low capital costs of the 767-300ER makes it cost competitive in the fuel scenarios that are likely within its six year lease period.
- The 757-200W has fractionally lower direct seat mile costs than the 767, but it has lower capacity and its more limited range reduce its operational usefulness.
- The A330-200 has the best operational flexibility but its higher capital costs makes it the most expensive aircraft to operate in the period of interest.
- In a final article, we will add the revenue capability of the aircraft. This is where the A330-200 gets the chance to show if it can cover its higher direct costs with its higher earnings capability, thereby generating more value for the airline.
Mitsubishi delays MRJ90 EIS one year, IDs “issues”
- HOLIDAY SCHEDULE: Unless there is major, breaking news, Leeham News and Comment is taking the Christmas-New Year’s holidays off. We resume our normal publishing scheduled Jan. 4, 2016.
Update, Dec. 25: The Seattle Times reports the MRJ90 doesn’t meet the 150% certification requirement.
Update, Dec. 24: Mitsubishi’s biggest customer for the MRJ90 weighed in on the latest news of a delay and structural issues. From today’s Wall Street Journal:
SkyWest Inc., the largest U.S. regional airline operator by revenue, has as many as 200 of the Mitsubishi jets on order. In advance of Mitsubishi’s news conference Thursday, a SkyWest spokeswoman said the company was sticking with its order, but said it was “dependent on flying contracts, scope and aircraft availability.”
There are enough caveats in that statement to be cause for worry about the solidity of the order. Trans States Airlines of the USA, the second largest customer, could not be reached (it was after hours) by the WSJ for comment. Launch customer and launch operator ANA stood behind the company, the WSJ reported.
Original post:
Dec. 23, 21015: Mitsubishi issued a press release at 4pm Tokyo time Dec. 24 (11pm Seattle Time Dec. 23), announcing a delay of entry into service by about a year from 2Q2017. The press release said “issues” arose during flight testing, but the PR did not identify what these are.
The press conference is going on as this is posted. The press release is below. The short PPT/PDF presentation is here: 20151224_Update on MRJ Development Status
Top 10 Stories in 2015
- HOLIDAY SCHEDULE: Unless there is major, breaking news, Leeham News and Comment is taking the Christmas-New Year’s holidays off. We resume our normal publishing scheduled Jan. 4, 2016.
- So what do we have? Mitsubishi holding an MRJ briefing on Christmas Eve, Tokyo time. There’s no webcast or dial-in number but we’ll look for the stories coming out of this briefing and post something just for the record.
Here are the Top 10 stories on Leeham News and Comment for 2015:
Pontifications: Looking ahead to 2016
Jan. 4, 2016, © Leeham Co. Let’s take a walk through our outlook for 2016.
Boeing is 100
There will no doubt be all kinds of celebrations at the Air Show. To the extent possible, I would imagine Boeing will try to have a whole lot of orders to announce there. There will be all kinds of run-up to the 100th anniversary. Few throw a party as well as Boeing. (Just don’t sing “Happy Birthday;” I never have liked this song.)
It’s a great achievement and we should all celebrate with Boeing for the next seven months.
Read more
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Posted on January 4, 2016 by Scott Hamilton
Airbus, Boeing, Bombardier, Comac, Farnborough Air Show, Leeham News and Comment, Mitsubishi, Pontifications, Pratt & Whitney
747-8, 777 Classic, A380, Airbus, Boeing, Bombardier, C919, Comac, CS100, CS300, CSeries, Farnborough Air Show, Mitsubishi, MRJ90, Pontifications, Pratt & Whitney