Boeing posts $6 billion loss on troubled programs

livemint.com:

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. Boeing is debt-ridden, mistrusted and mistake-prone, but also capable of turning itself around. That is the assessment of Chief Executive Officer Kelly Ortberg, who took over the beleaguered jet maker in August.

After reporting a $6.17 billion quarterly loss, Ortberg told staff that much work remains before the manufacturer is able to build a new airplane, something it hasn’t done since it launched the 787 Dreamliner in 2009. “We need to know what’s going on, not only with our products, but with our people," Ortberg said in a memo to employees. “And most importantly, we need to prevent the festering of issues and work better together to identify, fix, and understand the root cause." In his memo, which included remarks prepared for his first earnings call with analysts, Ortberg said the company must repair a broken culture, shrink itself and improve execution on new plane varieties, all of which are delayed by years.

Boeing has been hobbled in recent years by two fatal crashes, a criminal conviction, a midair blowout, production delays and most recently a strike. The earnings themselves revealed little new; the company this month disclosed preliminary results and plans to cut 17,000 jobs. Striking union members are voting Wednesday on a new contract proposal.

Boeing posted its biggest quarterly loss since 2020, when the pandemic shut down air travel. The company had warned of deep losses after taking billions of dollars in charges on troubled programs. The third-quarter results were in line with its warning: a net loss of $9.97 a share on revenue of $17.8 billion.