Boeing Has Plenty On Its Plate

2018 has been a tough year for Boeing. The trade war with China, the cancelled Iran deal, the regulatory woes over the Embraer deal and the Lion Air Max crash have all come back to back. A special report on the issues.

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To say that Boeing is stuck between a rock and a hard place would be an understatement. It was a happy state of affairs when they flagged off2018 with the MAX launched in the summer of 2017 growing from strength to strength. 12 months later, though, Boeing is staring at a plateful of woes.

There is the joint venture (JV) between Boeing and Embraer to take on the Airbus Bombardier deal that has its own regulatory woes, the China operations including a plant in that country comes into increasing focus as relations between the US-China get acrimonious over trade and, finally, the Lion Air crash means that the airlines relationship with its biggest single aisle customer is frayed, to put it mildly.

Many have termed the Lion Air-Boeing difference of opinion as a $22 billion feud. Things came to a head when the influential Rusdi Kirana, who owns Lion Air, threatened to cancel all future orders for Boeing aircraft because of the `unfair` Boeing reaction to the crash.

Almost two decades after he and his brother scrapped together their life’s savings to lease a 377-200 to commence operations from Jakarta to Bali, Kirana, 55, has become a legend in his home country and in the process turned Lion Air into one of the world’s biggest and fastest growing airlines with one of the biggest order books in the world. And with the Indonesian aviation growing at a galloping pace, Kirana is at the heart of this revolution, perhaps the most important figure in aviation in the region.

In interviews to multiple outlets, an incensed Kirana said: “I was in a tough situation and they decided to beat me up. They have been behaving unethically, they have been acting immorally in this relationship, so we just go our separate ways.” To flight Global, he said: "I just don't want to deal with somebody with no respect."