Philip Condit and Boeing 777: Production and Sales Design and Development - Case Study Example

Project Management Case Analysis - Philip Condit and Boeing 777: Production & Sales Design and Development - Table of Contents I. Introduction ………………………………………………………… 3 II. Problem Statement …………………………………………………. 3 III. Definition of Technology …………………………………………... 3 IV. Production Design and Development of Boeing 777 ………………. 4 V. Reported Technical Problems in Boeing 777 ………………………. 5 VI. Reported Sales Development and Customer Complaints ………….. 6 VII. Recommended Alternative Solutions to the Problem ……………… 6 VIII. Conclusion ………………………………………………………….. 7 References …………………………………………………………………… 8 - 9 Introduction Boeing is a large aerospace company that manufactures commercial jetliners as well as military aircrafts. For many years, the company has extended its services to NASA and the U.S. government for military aircraft purposes. Under the leadership of Philip Condit, the company accepted a project for the U.S. government wherein the company designed and manufactured Boeing 777 or the ‘triple seven.’ Triple seven is a huge aircraft that has the capability to seat between 367 to 550 passengers first flew back in 1994. The twinjet airliner was designed with a complete 3-D digital computer graphics. Upon building the triple seven, the company spent billions of dollars. (Phillips, 2001) Due to the huge money spent over the failure of Boeing 777, Philip Condit decided to resign from Boeing in 2003 as chief executive. (Phillips, 2006) In line with this matter, this study will gather relevant evidences and discuss about the technical problems that contributes to the failure of Boeing 777. In the end, the study will discuss the pros and cons of the selected alternative solutions to the main problem presented in the study. Problem Statement The relationship of technical related problems with the failure of Boeing 777. Definition of Technology According to Websters Dictionary, technology is defined as “...an applied science that includes the study of industrial arts one can apply toward practical use.” (Guralnik, 1980) In other words, technology is a method or process for handling a specific technical problem. Production Design and Development of Boeing 777 Specifically the technology approach used by Boeing in the development of Boeing 777 was based on cost, schedule, performance, and market competition instead of performance. Due to the company’s limited financial capacity, building Boeing 777 was a big gamble since there is a very big risk in doing things totally different from what the company is accustomed to build. (Main, 1992) In short, the effort made by Boeing’s R&D is more customer-driven rather than technology-driven. (Philip Condit, 1994) When it comes to developing an aircraft, there is a big difference in the technology demanded by a private industry as compared to the needs of the Government when it comes to a military plane. This is the main reason why it normally takes a longer time to develop a plane for the Government. In fact, it is said that a typical time frame to develop, produce, and deploy a new technology military planes is between 11 to 21 years. (DiMascio, 1993) On the contrary, it only took a little more than four years for the company to develop and deliver an operational Boeing 777. The conservative approach taken by Boeing can be traced back in 1970s and 1980s when the company decided not to apply the fly-by-wire, fly-by-light, flat panel video displays, as well as the advanced propulsion systems with Boeing 767 despite the fact that the said technology was already existing. (Holtby, 1986) Instead, the company believes more on a design-to-cost constraint wherein after the management focused more on evaluating the cost prior to going through the production system. (Gansler, 1989) This made the overall performance and technology of Boeing 777 suffers. Boeing 777 was actually designed and built with some of the existing technology such as the nine percent composite materials in the airframe, fly-by-wire; a new wing the company advertised as the most aerodynamically efficient airfoil developed for subsonic commercial aviation; advanced liquid-crystal flat-panel displays; the companys own patented two-way digital data bus (ARINC 629); a large and powerful engines that was ever used on a commercial airliner; and an advanced composite empennage. (Mulally, 1994) The company even spent a large some of money investing on new facilities to test the 777 avionics. (Proctor, 1994) The company even went out of its way to manufacture the composite empennage. (Benson, 1995) Despite all the different technology that was applied with Boeing 777, all the extra features were never a breakthrough. Reported Technical Problems in Boeing 777 Considering that the company has already went through a lot of research and deliberation with the use of computer aided technology in order to improve its service, their decision to adopt the Computer Assisted Three-Dimensional Interactive Application (CATIA) technology on the plane still encounters some technical problems. (Benson, 1994) One main reason for the failure of Boeing 777’s design is partly due to a cultural change within the environment. Since it was new for the company to implement a gradual shift in technology from the usual 2-D to 3-D, some of the engineers were very much reluctant in letting other people see their drawings prior to the completion of the design. (Condit, 1994; Woolsey, 1994) The development of the software used in Boeing 777 was also a failure. According to Woolsey (1994), the software was not designed to be user-friendly as it was expected to be. Lastly, Boeing 777 uses a total of three engines that was supplied by Pratt & Whitney, General Electric, and Rolls Royce. Normally, flying with two engines is enough to allow the pilot to have a safe flight. Flying with more than two huge engines would only result to the increase in the costs of fuel as well as operating costs unnecessarily. (Zanatta, 1994) Reported Sales Development and Customer Complaints The period between late 1990s up to 2002 was really tough for Boeing in terms of its sales performance. The decline in sales is not really the main problem but an after effect of the technical problems. It has been a common practice for Boeing engineers to keep on making some technical changes at the point when a problem would arise during the production period and even at the time when the customers receive the plane. (Main, 1992) For this reason, a lot of Boeing customers became very unhappy due to some maintenance delays. (Proctor, 1994) Recommended Alternative Solutions to the Problem Boeing should understand the customer’s requirements by heart before implementing the project. (Chapman, 2001) It is clear that the customer prefers a new technology for the aircraft but Boeing 777 was designed with existing technology back in the early- to mid-1990s. It seems that the main problem of Boeing engineers is the lack of teamwork. With a good teamwork (Chapman, 2001), Boeing engineers and staffs could easily brainstorm for the preparation of a reasonable project plan in order to prevent the unnecessary expenses such as the software design and the use of three engines. Also, the use of technology approach should be focused in performance instead of the cost, schedule, and market competition alone. Aiming to create a future market for the company, it is necessary for Boeing R&D group to continuously innovate and adopt new and existing technologies all the time. By simply recording all the important discoveries and sharing it with the team members could minimize the chances of developing defective aircraft. (Chapman, 2001) Also, it is necessary for the engineers and pilot to test the aircrafts before releasing the finish product to the customers. This way, the company can ensure that the customers’ satisfaction is always met. Conclusion Boeing admits that it is necessary for an aircraft manufacturing company to focus on technology approach especially in order to become successful in each project. (Condit, 1994) It could have been possible for Boeing to save millions of dollars in case the company spends more money in fixing the problems associated with its design during the production and after the plane has been delivered to the airlines. (Main, 1992) Boeing team should understand the customer’s requirements by heart before implementing the project. On the other hand, teamwork is necessary to minimize technical defects and other unnecessary expenses related to lack of communication and brainstorming among the Boeing engineers. By lowering the technical defects, the company could have made Boeing 777 successful as well as maintaining its customers satisfied. *** End *** References: 1 Benson, AF (1995) ‘Boeing Builds 777 Online Assembly’ Aviation Week & Space Technology. 2 Benson, AF (1994) ‘Boeing Launches 777 from PCs (Assembly)’ Aviation Week & Space Technology. 3 Chapman, JR. (2001) ‘Project Management Principles’ < http://www.hyperthot.com/ > 4 Condit, PC. (1994) ‘Personal Interview’ Seattle, Washington. 5 DiMascio, AJ. (1993) ‘The Project Cycle, Military Project Management Handbook’ New York: McGraw-Hill, Inc. 6 Gansler, JS. (1989) ‘Affording Defense’ Massachusetts: The MIT Press. 7 Guralnik, DB. (1980) ‘Webster’s New World Dictionary’ Ohio: William Collins Publishers, Inc. 8 Holtby, KF. (1986) ‘Summary Report, 1986 DSB Summer Study Commercial Airplane Procurement Practices, 767 Airliner Study’ Unpublished report prepared by the Defense Science Board. Washington: Department of Defense. 9 Main, J. (1992) ‘Betting on the 21st Century Jet. Fortune. 10 Mulally, A. (1994) ‘Personal Interview with Senior Vice President, Airplane Development and Definition’ Seattle, Washington. 11 Phillips, D. (2006) ‘News Analysis: Boeing Saga Offers Airbus a Tale’ International Herald Tribune. July 4, 2006. < http://www.iht.com > 12 Phillips, D. (2001) ‘Boeing Proposes New Air Traffic System: Company Offers to Advance Funds to Government for Massive Overhaul’ Washington Post. January 30, 2001; page E01. < http://www.washingtonpost.com/ > 13 Proctor, P. (1994) ‘Boeing Rolls Out 777 to Tentative Market’ Aviation Week & Space Technology. 14 Woolsey, JP. (1994) ‘777’ Air Transport World. 15 Zanatta, J. (1994) ‘Personal Interview with Director, Flight Test Engineering, The Boeing Company’ Seattle, Washington. Read More