Inslee tanker amendment dropped for DOD Reauthorization

Update, 10:30 AM PST: We have now confirmed that the House leadership has dropped the Inslee Amendment from the Defense Reauthorization Act that will be sent to the Senate.

We also received confirmation this morning from Inslee’s office that the letter below the jump was written in advance of House action because it had been learned Section 848 might be removed from the House version of the Act.

Original Post:

It appears the so-called Inslee Amendment in the House Defense Reauthorization Act demanding the US Air Force take into account illegal subsidies provided Airbus and Boeing in the KC-X competition may be in jeopardy.

The Seattle Post Intelligencer first reported that Washington State Congressman Rick Larsen was circulating a letter to senior House members calling for the Inslee Amendment (official known as Section 848 of the Reauthorization bill) to be retained in the House version as it goes over to the US Senate for consideration.

But a close reading of the letter raises questions whether the Amendment is or isn’t currently in the Act. The House is in the process of revising the Act before sending it to the Senate for approval. Time is short for the Senate to act before the Christmas recess, and a bill that is not controversial is needed to speed things along.

The House version has a reported 300 add-on provisions that could cause debate in the Senate, including Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, the Inslee Amendment and only the politicians in DC know what else.

The Don’t Ask provision was separated from the Act for a stand-alone vote yesterday in the House, where it passed. The Senate previously voted this down but another try is going to be made.

Read more

Outsourcing US Defense

As regular readers know, a major piece of controversy over the prospect of awarding the KC-X contract to EADS North America is the assertion that this will outsource US defense procurement to a foreign company.

We’ve noted in this space many times before that this issue, in this context, is a red herring, because the Defense Department has been doing so for years and is increasingly doing so–without the hue and cry that accompanies the prospect of EADS getting this contract.

A recent article by George Talbot of The Mobile Press-Register illustrates the outsourcing to foreign companies. While Talbot talks about EADS, because Mobile (AL) (which is, one may be reminded, part of the United States–the Confederacy did lose the Civil War) is where EADS plans to build the tanker, it is also the location of an Australian company called Austal that is poised to receive a contract to build the Navy’s Littoral Combat Ship (LCS).

Read more

737NG vs A320neo: an interesting chess game

Update, Dec. 13: FlightGlobal has this interview with Ryanair and its critique of the NEO.

Original Post:

The (London) Financial Times has this interview with Boeing Commercial Airplanes CEO Jim Albaugh in which he says there is no compelling reason now to re-engine the 737.

Boeing believes the newly announced Airbus A320neo family merely brings the legacy A320 family to parity with the 737 or at most provides only a 3%-4% direct operating cost advantage to the NEO which can be matched by yet more refinements to the 737.

Airbus refutes Boeing’s conclusions but won’t release its own numbers, regarding them as proprietary. But in a new study, The Business Case for the Bombardier CSeries, by AirInsight,  with which we are affiliated, AirInsight’s independent analysis concludes the NEO generally has at best a slight advantage over the 737-700 and 737-800–but nothing to shout about.

Read more

Lessors, banks in blistering critique of Airbus NEO

Our colleagues at Commercial Aviation Online put together the story below on lessor and banker reaction to the Airbus A320neo announcement December 1.

We knew–and previously referenced here–reluctance on the part of these groups to the NEO concept, but even we were stunned by the blistering response toward Airbus.

This is reprinted with permission.

Lessor and banks react to Airbus neo programme

Date: 06/12/2010 11:35
Source: Commercial Aviation Online
Location: London

The launch of the Airbus neo programme on 1 December with plans for a 2016 entry into service for the initial model has generated a lot of talk in the aviation finance community, particularly concerning the impact on residual values.

CAO spoke to lessors and bankers about the move and here’s what they had to say:

Read more

Boeing’s next 787 announcements

Update, Dec. 9: As a Commenter noted below, a French newspaper is reporting Boeing told Air France the first delivery of the 787 may be June or July. This falls within the 4-6 month delay we forecast on November 19. Several aerospace analysts since then have also forecast 4-6 months, with some a little shorter and some a little longer.

With 145 votes tallied to this Update in the First Delivery poll below, 17 (11.72%) predict first delivery will be in the second quarter; 28 (19.31%) say the third quarter, 46 (31.72%) say the fourth quarter and 44 (30.34%) say in 2012.

We think the test flights are most likely to resume in January. With 140 votes tallied to the Update, 12 votes (8.57%) say December, 57 (40.71%) say January and 68 (48.57%) say later in 2011.

And if there isn’t enough to consider, throw this into the hopper: Bloomberg reports the US will consider a patent infringement case filed by Pratt & Whitney against Rolls-Royce over, among other engines, the Trent 1000 powering the 787. PW asked that imports of the Trent 1000 be stopped until the infringement case is concluded, a process which could take 15 months.

We think blocking imports for the 787 won’t happen, but that’s what’s been asked.

With this new information, continue to vote–we’ll see if this sways opinion.

Original Post:

Stakeholders in the Boeing 787 program are naturally curious about the delay to the first delivery of the 787, the rescheduling of downstream deliveries to customers and resumption of flight tests.

But a cottage industry of speculation has arisen about when Boeing will make the announcements. Jon Ostrower of Flightblogger has written that Boeing seems to like to make delay announcements on or near holidays or big events when the news cycles are low or preoccupied with other matters. We’ve noticed the same thing–the most recent announcement was on Thanksgiving Eve, for example–and some Wall Street analysts we’ve talked to likewise expect the next announcement (or series of them) to be around the Christmas and/or New Year’s Holidays.

So in the spirit of having some fun, we’ve created some polls on the topics. What do readers think?

Read more

A350 begins fuselage construction, refines program management

Airbus has begun construction of the A350 fuselage.

Airbus photo, rendering

Airbus also announced refinements in the A350 program management to provide more accountability and coordination. This article describes it in Aviation Week, by Robert Wall.

Read more

EADS will likely win tanker, says Boeing consultant

Update, Dec. 9, 5:00 AM PST:

Politico has this profile on Loren Thompson.

Flight Global reports Brazil may select the KC-45 to replace its Boeing KC-137 (KC-135).

Update, 5:00 PM PST: Dominic Gates now has his story on this topic here.

Original Post:

George Talbot of The Mobile Press Register posted this story today in which Loren Thompson, an aerospace defense analyst who has done work for Boeing, says Boeing has concluded EADS is going to win the KC-X tanker competition.

In Talbot’s article, Thompson once again advances the Boeing line about WTO and Airbus’ illegal subsidies as evidence of a USAF “bias toward EADS.”

There is just one problem with this line of allegation with respect to the WTO issue:

US law doesn’t allow the USAF to take the WTO panel finding into account, and Thompson, Boeing and its Congressional supporters know it.

Read more

Airbus NEO won’t kill CSeries: New study

Airbus’ A320 NEO won’t kill the Bombardier CSeries, a new study concludes, issued today by AirInsight.

The study, “The Business Case for the Bombardier CSeries,” which we co-authored, is discussed on the AirInsight blog.

The study began as an update to AirInsight’s report in December 2009 on the prospect of re-engining the Airbus A320 and Boeing 737 families. As Airbus COO-Customers John Leahy repeatedly asserted that to re-engine the A320 would kill the business case for the CSeries, AirInsight broadened its update into a full, in-depth study. AirInsight concluded that the business case for the CSeries is sound.

Read more

USAF, EADS need to come forward with full details

The USAF and EADS need to come forward with full details to fully explain the latest cock-up (a British term, not an obscene one) in which the Air Force mistakenly sent EADS and Boeing proprietary information about the other company’s KC-X submission.

EADS, the Air Force and Boeing say that when EADS and Boeing discovered the error, the companies began a procedure that has been in place for years to seal up the files and computers and to notify the USAF of the error. The Air Force initially said, in essence, “no harm, no foul.” But then in classic Wikileaks fashion, information dribbled out bit-by-bit that there was more to the story than the Air Force–and EADS–let on.

At a press conference–which we were at–EADS North America CEO Sean O’Keefe gave a detailed response to questions about the matter. But within days, it was charged by Lexington Institute’s Loren Thompson that EADS had actually opened the proprietary file but Boeing had not. He did not cite sources for his information, and his close ties to Boeing immediately raised the suspicion that Boeing leaked this information to him.

Read more

A320neo EIS 2016-17

Airbus has confirmed to us the planned EIS of the A320neo family. The company initially announced only that the A320neo would enter service in the Spring of 2016. A spokesman confirmed our estimates of the family’s EIS:

A320 EIS: Spring 2016

A321 EIS: 4Q2016

A319 EIS: Spring 2017

Read more