Dennis Muilenburg may help bring home the bomber.
The new Boeing (NYSE: BA) CEO, with his reputation for bringing bottom-line performance to the company's defense and space unit, may be the tipping point in Boeing's favor for the $55 billion long-range strike bomber contract.
That's the view of Wayne Plucker, director of North America research in aerospace and defense for Frost and Sullivan in San Antonio, who said Pentagon leaders are familiar with Muilenburg — and that could weigh in Boeing's favor.
“I think it’s additive,” Plucker said. “It’s one of those nice added elements, someone... they’re comfortable dealing with, and from whom they won’t expect surprises. At this point in the procurement game, that an important thing.”
The Air Force is to choose by the end of the summer between a Boeing-Lockheed Martin team or Northrop Grumman to land the 100-aircraft bomber contract.
While Northrop Grumman built the most recent bomber, the B-2, Boeing is associated with some of the most famous names in bomber history. In particular, Boeing built the B-52, powered by eight engines in four pods, which continues as the nation’s primary heavy bomber, 60 years after it was introduced.
“My personal sense is that Boeing has the legacy that would help to frame it in their direction,” Plucker said.
Muilenburg’s credentials in the defense community come from the fact that from 2009 through 2013 he served as CEO of St. Louis-based Boeing Defense Space & Security. He won a reputation for effective cost-cutting, keeping margins up even while federal procurement was going down. He was named Boeing CEO on June 23.
Winning the contract is keenly important for Boeing because it likely will be the last new military airframe for as many as 20 years. With Boeing’s St. Louis-produced jet fighters nearing the end of their product lives, Boeing needs a big new contract to keep the St. Louis lines running.
While assembly of the bomber would likely be in St. Louis or be done by Lockheed Martin, Boeing Puget Sound’s experience in carbon composites and military aircraft, would give Western Washington a significant role, Plucker said.
The Puget Sound area could be a “major component supplier” for the new bomber, despite the fact that the region already is jammed with commercial aircraft work, he said.
“There’s a lot of capability there in large airframes,” he said, about the Puget Sound region. “Pieces, parts — they could be done on several of the side lines.
