In an interview with CNBC this morning, Boeing CEO Kelly Ortberg confirmed that China has stopped taking deliveries of new Boeing aircraft and are now looking to resell them to other airlines.
Ortberg said that there were about 50 aircraft that were scheduled to be delivered to China this year. He added, saying, “We’re going to be pretty pragmatic with what we do here. For those airplanes that haven’t been built yet, we’ll be looking to maybe redirect those to other customers.”
Boeing does not expect this to disrupt their production and performance, which has been better than expected in recent months. They are preparing to increase the production of Boeing 787 and 737 aircraft in the near future.
New Homes For China-Bound Planes
Bloomberg reports that Air India is “eager” to take Boeing planes that were canceled by China. They’re no strangers to picking up China-bound deliveries, as they benefited from past Boeing groundings in China. So far, they have a total of 41 Boeing 737 Max aircraft in their fleet that were originally intended for Chinese airlines.
Malaysia Airlines is also in talks with Boeing for deliveries canceled by China, according to Bernama.
Although this all seems simple, I imagine that this will still take time and airlines will be due for a process. Because cabin configurations are different for each customer based on local laws as well as the needs of an airline, adjustments and refurbishments will have to happen before they can take to the skies.
Nonetheless, this is still an opportunity for airlines to capitalize on open delivery slots amid the lagging deliveries for Boeing aircraft.
What a Trade Dispute Looks Like In the Sky
The return of China-bound Boeing aircraft is perhaps one of the best visual examples of the trade dispute. The above photo shows N242BE returning to Seattle on Tuesday, April 22.
N242BE was originally delivered to China last month. But with escalated trade tensions between the US and China, this became one of three Boeing deliveries returned to the US so far.
N230BE was another aircraft returned to the US, and it was the first of the three we have seen. The jet arrived in Seattle this past weekend on the 19th.
Featured image by Michael Vi, Shutterstock.
