Deep Stall: The Turbulent Story of Boeing Commercial Airlines (review)

In the panoply of airframe manufacturers, the Boeing Company holds special status. Founded in 1916, it has since the beginning of the jet age dominated the jet airliner market. In 1985 a passenger had a 75 percent chance of boarding a Boeing airliner when flying virtually anywhere on the globe. Boeing attained that status with path-breaking jet transports—the 707, 727, 737, 747, 757, and 767—as well as a host of variants. Much of this story is well known, and the authors do not dwell on the details of history. Rather, they focus their analysis on what has transpired since the 1980s and the rise of the European multinational Airbus Industrie as a major competitor now at parity with Boeing in large airliner sales.

Philip K. Lawrence, the Aerospace Research Center's director at the University of West England, and David W. Thornton, author of Airbus Industrie: The Politics of an International Industrial Collaboration (1995) and professor at Campbell University, present a story of loss of market share by Boeing to its European challenger. Lawrence and Thornton approach this rivalry by noting that Boeing represents a strategic asset for the United States, both economically and militarily. They note that as a leading exporter, Boeing is important to the United States for helping resolve its trade imbalance, although there is reason to wonder if this is still as true as it once was because so much Boeing manufacturing is now done overseas. The authors state: "Some commentators in the West now doubt the significance of aerospace, but those in the developed world who are dubious about this should look to the drive in the Far East to emulate the West's achievements in this field" (p. 2). Lawrence and Thornton suggest that it is important for the United States that Boeing remains a viable airframe manufacturer.

There is reason to believe that Boeing may not succeed in this endeavor. The authors contend that when Boeing achieved its near-monopoly status as a commercial airliner manufacturer in the 1970s, it turned increasingly conservative, from the standpoint of both economic exposure and technical innovation. The authors believe that "Boeing has been inclined to rely on a strategy of cost competitiveness, derivative development and product evolution, rather than technological advancement, as its favoured way of consolidating market share" (p. 92). This strategy served well for a time, but the continued reliance on derivatives of 737s, 747s, and 767s has become less attractive over time. Boeing might improve the aircraft significantly, the authors believe, but airlines do not crave aircraft based on 1960s or 1970s technology; they want more modern and economical airplanes.

In the view of the authors, the combination of Boeing's conservative approach toward aircraft design with an aggressive Airbus that developed a family of more modern jetliners that challenged Boeing's products, the American firm's loss of market share was predictable. The story of Airbus's A320 is a case in point. In the 1980s, Airbus adopted digital fly-by-wire (DFBW) technology for aircraft control instead of relying on the long-standing mechanical approach employed by Boeing. NASA had pioneered these technologies and tried to persuade Boeing to adopt them, but a combination of attitudes at the company ranging from "not invented here" to "good enough for my daddy, good enough for me" prompted its rejection. Boeing did not adopt DBFW until recently.

But there is reason to question if Boeing's technological conservatism has served it poorly. DBFW may be more of a choice than a clearly superior technology to mechanical systems, and there are appropriate rationales for continuing proven technologies. Similarly, Boeing's reluctance to embrace composite structures until recently allowed it to avoid some early-adopter pitfalls experienced by Airbus.

Lawrence and Thornton conclude with efforts by Boeing to overcome Airbus's ascendancy through World Trade Organization sanctions (since that company is a public–private partnership and...