Boeing CEO considered resigning, wishes he’d visited MAX victim families sooner


Dennis Muilenburg, CEO of the Boeing Co., said Wednesday that he had considered resigning amid the 737 MAX crisis.

Dennis Muilenburg, CEO of the Boeing Co., said Wednesday that he had considered resigning amid the 737 MAX crisis.

ANNA MONEYMAKER/NEW YORK TIMES

Boeing Co. Chicago, IL


By Daniel McCoy – Reporter, Wichita Business Journal
Nov 6, 2019, 1:29pm CST Updated 2 hours ago

Dennis Muilenburg, CEO of the Boeing Co., said on Wednesday that he has considered resigning amid the the fallout from the crashes of two of the company’s 737 MAX aircraft.

“It’s fair to say I have thought about it,” Muilenburg said at the New York Times DealBook Conference. “But to be frank, that’s not what’s in my character. These two accidents, they happened on my watch at Boeing. I feel obligated … to see it through. We owe the world safe flight. As long as the board allows me to serve in this role, I’m going to serve in it and I’m going to put everything into it that I can.”

Interviewed on stage by Andrew Ross Sorkin, the embattled CEO also addressed his decision to forgo bonuses and other future incentives until the 737 MAX fleet is back and safely flying passengers again, which was first made known on Tuesday by Boeing Chairman David Calhoun during an interview with CNBC that represented a public vote of confidence in the CEO.

Muilenburg said he made the decision to make that request — which he communicated to Calhoun last weekend — after meeting with the families of victims of the crashes last week during two days of testimony to committees from both the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives.

“I wish I had gone to visit them earlier,” Muilenburg said. “That’s going to stick with me forever.”

Muilenburg did not give a specific dollar amount of what he will forgo when asked, but did say it would be tens of millions of dollars by the time it is all figured out.

He also said that he plans beyond that to personally donate to charities that will help victims’ families.

The two crashes killed a total of 346 people.

Muilenburg on Wednesday again stressed Boeing’s (NYSE: BA) renewed commitment to safety in the wake of those crashes, which have kept the MAX jets grounded since March.

And as the company works toward returning the airliner to service with upgraded software and enhanced training, possibly as soon as by the end of the year in U.S., Muilenburg said that safety focus will be the determining factor in when exactly the MAX returns to the air.

“Everything we are doing now is focused on safely returning the MAX to flight,” he said. “We’re going to take the time to get it right. This is not going to be governed by a particular timeline, as you’ve heard from the FAA as well.”

The timing of that return is being closely watched in Wichita, where the 737 MAX is the most important single aircraft program to the local economy.

Muilenburg has said that a return that slips too far past the company’s fourth-quarter target could result in reduced output on the 737 or a potential temporary halt to the program.

The city’s largest employer, Spirit AeroSystems Inc., builds around 70 percent of the structure on the MAX on a 737 program that accounts for around half of its annual sales.

That 737 work filters down into the local supply base to help support thousands of more jobs outside of Spirit (NYSE: SPR) in Wichita.

Spirit continues to build the 737 at the pre-grounding rate of 52 per month.

It now expects to stay at that rate for at least the next two years as it burns through inventory built up during the grounding period in which Boeing trimmed its output to 42 per month and halted MAX deliveries to customers.

Prior to the grounding, both Boeing and suppliers like Spirit had been expecting the production rate to increase this summer to 57 per month.

More specific production questions could come Boeing's way as the company is expected to present at the Baird Global Industrial Conference in Chicago.