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Boeing has revealed an ambitious strategy to build its next airplane in the “metaverse” as it follows in the footsteps of multiple other companies in a move toward digital innovation.
Critics say Boeing has repeatedly made similar bold pledges on a digital revolution, with mixed results. But insiders say the overarching goals of improving quality and safety have taken on greater urgency and significance as the company tackles multiple threats.
The planemaker is entering 2022 fighting to reassert its engineering dominance after the 737 MAX crisis, while laying the foundation for a future aircraft program over the next decade - a $15 billion gamble. It also aims to prevent future manufacturing problems like the structural flaws that have waylaid its 787 Dreamliner over the past year.
"It's about strengthening engineering," Boeing's chief engineer, Greg Hyslop, in his first interview in nearly two years. "We are talking about changing the way we work across the entire company."
After years of wild market competition, the need to deliver on bulging order books has opened up a new front in Boeing's war with Europe's Airbus (AIR.PA), this time on the factory floor.
Airbus Chief Executive Guillaume Faury, a former automobile research boss, has pledged to "invent new production systems and leverage the power of data" to optimise its industrial system.
Boeing's approach so far has been marked by incremental advances within specific jet programs or tooling, rather than the systemic overhaul that characterises Hyslop's push today.
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