Boeing: 747's future as a passenger aircraft is bleak
Boeing is finally acknowledging its famed 747 likely has little future left as a commercial passenger jet.
The U.S. jetmaker on Tuesday unveiled its annual market forecast that projects aircraft sales over the next 20 years. For the first time, Boeing’s forecast no longer includes a category for “very large” aircraft -- i.e., the 747. Instead, Boeing is now lumping the segment in with its category for “medium and large” widebody planes that includes the strong-selling 777.
“We don’t see much demand for really big aircraft going forward,’’ Randy Tinseth, Boeing’s vice president for marketing, said to Bloomberg News ahead of the Paris Air Show.
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Boeing’s bearish outlook on “very large” aircraft isn’t focused solely on its own 747. The company also has taken a dim view on rival Airbus’s A380 superjumbo jet.
“We find it hard to believe that Airbus will deliver the rest of their A380s in backlog,” Tinseth added to to a gathering of journalists in Paris that included Bloomberg.
The A380, of course, is the world’s largest passenger aircraft. It and the 747 are the only four-engine passenger jets that remain in production at either Airbus or Boeing. Sales for both have been slow, raising the possibility the jetmakers’ will clear their backlog for the planes without new orders.
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Speaking specifically of the 747, The Seattle Times writes “the market for the plane has eroded over time as airlines have switched from four-engine to more fuel-efficient twin-engine jets. At the same time, route networks have evolved to support smaller planes flying more frequently and directly, rather than big planes going through giant hubs.”
Boeing has long predicted such a trend in the market, though – until recently – its executives continued to insist that the 747 would have at least a small role for passenger flights going forward.
"There is still a fair amount of interest" from airlines, Eric Lindblad, then Boeing’s general manager of Boeing's 747 program, said to Today in the Sky in 2014 as the company delivered its 1,500th 747 to Lufthansa. "Enough that we're going to sit here today and say we expect we're going to be building the 747-8 for quite a bit longer."
That may hold true for Boeing’s freighter version – the 747-8F – and its VIP types of the jet, though the latter is just a small niche for Boeing.
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But even Boeing now appears to concede that the 747 is not likely to continue to be an option that airlines want for passenger service. Instead, airlines have increasingly moved toward two-engine jets like Boeing’s 777 or Airbus’ A330 and A350.
Boeing has only five orders remaining for its 747-8i passenger version, and – the Times notes – three of those are “for bankrupt Russian carrier Transaero that may or may not find a home elsewhere.” As for Boeing's freighter version of the 747, the company "has just 15 unfilled 747 freighter orders in its backlog," according to the Times.
That would last through the decade’s end, though an improving cargo market and future Air Force One orders could extend the frame’s lifespan.
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Meanwhile, Airbus remains bullish on the concept of very large aircraft. That’s even though sales of its A380 superjumbo have stalled to the point where Airbus could be nearing the end of its backlog, too.
But John Leahy, Airbus’s sales chief is sticking to the company’s belief that the airline industry will realize a need for its double-decked jet to help fly more passengers while facing constraints like congestion and airport slot restrictions.
Leahy also responded to Boeing’s gloomy projections for very large aircraft.
“They would do that,” Leahy said to Bloomberg. “The 747-8 isn’t selling. We have no intention of sharing that market with them.”
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