[SteveGerencser]

Boeing merged with Lockheed/Martin when L/M was in serious trouble and rumors say it was pushed by the DOD because of all the L/M defense contracts involved. This then lead to the worst parts of L/M (management over engineering) gaining a foothold at Boeing (Engineering over Management).

The rest is a long, slow, decline into Boeing being what L/M was when they needed to be rescued.

[bradknowles]

I thought the real damage of management over engineering was done when they merged with McDonnell Douglas, and it was the MDD managers who got put into all the cushy higher level jobs?

Or did that happen twice?

[shiroiushi]

I think his post is correct, except that he unfortunately got M-D confused with L-M and is probably outside the edit window now.

[Vecr]

I'm pretty sure Boeing did not merge with Lockheed Martin. In this alternate history was it because of the F-35 contract?

[HideousKojima]

ULA (Boeing and Lockheed's spaceflight division) is a joint venture between Boeing and Lockheed. Maybe they're referring to that?

[rqtwteye]

I think the key is to have leaders that have passion for the product and aren’t just interested in making profits and increasing stock price.

When you look at people like Gates, Jobs, Musk, Huang, they are cutthroat businessmen but they also have passion for their products. When I listen to interviews with a lot of US car CEOs, they seem to be interested only tangentially interested in cars, it’s just all numbers.

[Sabinus]

At some stage capitalism/free market needs to happen to those companies. If they can't perform they should die and the military contracts moved on.

[paulmd]

rather comically, the military is not taking boeing's word for it. they strip down and inspect the entire aircraft before acceptance.