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At Boeing Co’s Factory of the Future, immersive 3-D engineering designs are connected to robots talking to each other as mechanics around the world use Microsoft Corp. HoloLens headsets.

It’s a snapshot of an ambitious new Boeing strategy to unite its sprawling design, manufacturing and flight service operations into a single digital ecosystem – in just two years.

Critics say Boeing has repeatedly made similar bold promises about a digital revolution, with mixed results. However, according to insiders, the overarching goals of improving quality and security have become more urgent and important as the company faces multiple threats.

Starting in 2022, the aircraft maker is struggling to regain its technical dominance after the 737 MAX crisis, while laying the foundation for a future aircraft program over the next decade – a $ 15 billion risk. It is also designed to prevent future manufacturing issues such as the structural flaws that its 787 Dreamliner noticed last year.

“It’s about strengthening technology,” Boeing’s chief engineer Greg Hyslop told Reuters in his first interview in almost two years. “We’re talking about changing the way we work across the company.”

After years of fierce competition in the marketplace, the need to deliver when order books are full has opened a new front in Boeing’s war against Europe’s Airbus, this time at the factory.

Airbus CEO Guillaume Faury, a former head of automotive research, has pledged to “invent new production systems and harness the power of data” to optimize his industrial system.

Boeing’s approach so far has been shaped by incremental advances within certain Jet programs or tools rather than the systemic overhaul that characterizes Hyslop’s advance today.

The simultaneous advance of both aircraft giants is emblematic of a global digital revolution, as automakers like Ford Motor Co and social media companies like Facebook parent Meta Platforms Inc. work and play in an immersive virtual world sometimes referred to as Metaverse .

So how does the Metaverse – a shared digital space that often uses Virtual Reality or Augmented Reality and accessible via the Internet – work in aviation?

Boeing’s holy grail for the next new aircraft, like Airbus, is to build and link virtual three-dimensional replicas of the jet’s “digital twin” and the production system that can run simulations.

Behind the digital mockups is a “digital thread” that brings together all information about the aircraft from the start – from airline requirements to millions of parts and thousands of pages of certification documents – right down into the supply chain.

The revision of outdated paper-based practices could bring about major changes.

According to Hyslop, more than 70% of Boeing’s quality problems are due to a design problem. Boeing believes such tools will be central to getting a new aircraft to market in just four or five years from launch.

“You get speed, improved quality, better communication and better responsiveness when problems arise,” said Hyslop.

“If the quality of the supplier base is better, if the aircraft industry converges more smoothly, if you minimize rework, the financial performance will come.”

ENORMOUS CHALLENGE

But the plan faces enormous challenges.

Skeptics point to technical problems with Boeing’s mini-jumbo 777X and the T-7A RedHawk military training jet, which were developed using digital tools.

Boeing has also placed too much emphasis on shareholder return at the expense of technical dominance and has continued to cut R&D spending, Teal Group analyst Richard Aboulafia said.

“Is it worth pursuing? Definitely,” Aboulafia said. “Will it solve all of your problems? No.”

Juggernauts like the aircraft parts manufacturer Spirit AeroSystems have already invested in digital technology. Large aircraft manufacturers have partnerships with the French software manufacturer Dassault Systemes. But hundreds of smaller vendors around the world lack the capital or human resources to make big leaps.

Many were weakened by the MAX and coronavirus crisis that followed a decade of price pressure from Boeing or Airbus.

“Not only are you telling us what hardware we can buy, but now specifying all that fancy digital junk that goes with it?” said a supply chain manager.

‘A LONG GAME’

Boeing itself recognized that digital technology alone is not a panacea. It has to come with organizational and cultural changes across the company, industry sources say.

Boeing recently hired veteran engineer Linda Hapgood to oversee “digital transformation,” which, according to an industry source, was supported by more than 100 engineers.

Hapgood is best known for converting black and white paper drawings of the 767 tanker’s cable bundles into 3D images, and then adding tablets and HoloLens augmented reality headsets to the mechanics. The quality has improved by 90%, said an insider.

In her new role, Hapgood hired engineers to work on a digital twin for a now-scrapped mid-range aircraft called the NMA.

It also draws on experience from the MQ-25 aerial refueling drone and the T-7A Red Hawk.

Boeing “built” the first T-7A jets in simulation according to a model-based design. The T-7A was launched in just 36 months.

Even so, the program struggles with part bottlenecks, design delays, and additional test requirements.

Boeing is launching its 777X wing factory in Washington state, where layout and robot optimization were initially done digitally. But the broader program is years behind schedule and facing certification challenges.

“It’s a long game,” said Hyslop. “Each of these efforts addressed part of the problem. But now let’s do it from start to finish.”