Boeing Essay ⋆ Business Essay Examples ⋆ EssayEmpire

The Boeing Airplane Company (originally Pacific Aero Products) was founded in 1916 in Seattle, Washington, by Yale engineer William Boeing and Navy engineer George Westervelt. It was only 13 years since the Wright brothers’ successful flight, and the aviation industry would go through a number of changes, Boeing changing with it. When the company was folded in with Boeing’s airline (est. 1927) and Pacific Air Transport, it became the United Aircraft and Transport Corporation, and went on an acquisition spree of smaller aviation companies.

1933 saw the introduction of the Boeing 247, the first aircraft significantly similar to modern passenger planes, with an autopilot, retractable landing gear, cantilevered wings with wing flaps, deicing boots, and a metal semi-monocoque construction. The modern airplane had arrived. It was also the first model of aircraft to be sabotaged; when a nitroglycerin device was detonated on a 247 over Indiana, the New York Times headline put the then-unfamiliar word bomber in quotation marks.

United both manufactured airplanes and flew them, and knew the 247 was first in its class—first of a new class—so it kept the first 60, gaining a competitive advantage on other airlines. This was one of the things that led to the 1934 Air Mail Act, in the spirit of trustbusting and the New Deal: Corporations were no longer allowed to both manufacture and fly planes. United was thus split into three companies: United Airlines, the United Aircraft Corporation, and the Boeing Airplane Company. Boeing continued to be at the forefront of aircraft design, building the “flying boat” (the Boeing 314) for the Pan Am airline in 1939. The largest passenger plane of its time, it carried 90 passengers on transoceanic flights.

Boeing also developed the pressurized cabin, allowing planes to travel above the weather, an innovation taken for granted now, but which revolutionized air travel and paved the way for the widespread commercial flights of today. In the early days of the Cold War, Boeing carved out a position in the defense industry, alongside competitors Lockheed Martin and McDonnell Douglas. It remained and remains the leading aircraft manufacturer, especially in passenger planes—introducing the first jet airliner in the early 1950s, the first commercial jet (the 707) in 1958, and the 747 in 1970. The 747 remains Boeing’s most successful aircraft, and indeed one of the most famous aircraft by any manufacturer. Development cost over $1 billion, and the final product seated 450 passengers on two decks, on a craft with an intercontinental range. Almost 40 years later, the 747 remains in production, something that can be said of few vehicles of any mode.

Boeing acquired McDonnell Douglas in 1997 when its competitor fell on hard times, giving the company a near-monopoly on intercontinental aircraft. Its main competitor since the 1980s has been Airbus, a European consortium formed in 1970. While Airbus’s early successes were in the then-untapped short to-medium-range aircraft market, it now competes directly with Boeing in the long-range market, and has enjoyed a steadily increasing share of new orders worldwide. Boeing and the American government have disputed Airbus’s use of research and development subsidies from the European Union, claiming they violate the World Trade Organization (and when the complaint was first lodged, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade); a 1992 agreement limited those subsidies.

In the 21st century, Boeing has lost the coveted Jet Strike Fighter project for the U.S. Defense Department to Lockheed Martin, and continues to battle with Airbus. But it is the principal contractor for the International Space Station and a prominent contributor to NASA’s manned Mars mission.

Bibliography:

Kenny Kemp, Flight of the Titans: Boeing, Airbus, and the Battle for the Future of Air Travel (Virgin Books, 2007);
John Newhouse, Boeing versus Airbus: The Inside Story of the Greatest International Competition in Business (Vintage, 2008);
Joe Sutter and Jay Spenser, 747: Creating the World’s First Jumbo Jet and Other Adventures in a Life in Aviation (Collins, 2007).

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