Dreamliner's woes are just a spot of turbulence, says Boeing boss Jim McNerney The global grounding was a major setback for a plane that had already been delayed by a series of production problems which meant initial deliveries were three years behind schedule. For McNerney, the Dreamliner challenge remains high up in his in-tray, particularly given that the company admitted in April that it wasn't exactly sure what the problem with the battery was. "We have a good idea of the one or two things that it could have been," he says in an interview ahead of the Paris show. Quite frankly, our solution is more robust because we weren't focused on one thing. Our approach was to get all the world's experts on lithium ion technology working with us, put together a fault tree of the 84 things that could have gone wrong, and we worked every element of this fault tree. And so we are highly confident that we have a more robust solution than we would have had if we were just working on one problem. When the US Federal Aviation Authority called McNerney in mid-January to say the Dreamliner was to be grounded, he admits he was disappointed, But, he says, "we rolled up our sleeves and went to work." Asked whether he considered quitting over the issue, McNerney, who has been at the aviation and defence giant's helm since July 2005, says it was the last thing on his mind. "The last thing that we thought of was to give up on this airplane or to give up personally in any way, shape or form," he said. We have challenges like this every day. Some of them are more public than others. He is aware, unsurprisingly, of the potential damage to the Dreamliner brand but does not think the problems will have a lasting impact. "We have stumbles from time to time," he says. The data have shown us there was a dip initially but that our company got a lot of credit for the way that we approached the problem. The data tell us that our brand has emerged stronger from having gone through it in the right way. Many of the risks and new materials and technologies that Boeing has taken with the new plane will be used across its fleet, rather than just in the Dreamliner. As a result, McNerney suggests that the pain the company has experienced will have a long pay-off period. We have undergone a sea change with the 787. We absorbed a lot of development risk in going through it, but we always knew we would be very glad we did it because we could deploy it across the rest of our fleet," he said. These kind of game-changing innovations are composite airframes, all-electric planes, and increasing ceramics in engines. Despite the high media profile of the Dreamliner and its woes, it is not the only product Boeing has to talk about. The next much anticipated launch will be of the 777X family of wide-body planes, a rival to Airbus's A350 series. The plane's wings will be made of composite materials - with new engines - and McNerney estimates that, based on board approval, it will be launched in "late 2019 to mid 2020." As for the price? "We will price to value," he says. Should customers and investors expect similar problems with the 777X as were seen with the Dreamliner? The wing we do for the 777 will be a fourth generation air foil. So we're getting pretty far down the learning curve with this composite. That's where you'll start to see the benefit of all the pain and suffering we went through. Customer interest in both the Dreamliner and the 777X remains strong, he says, and points to Singapore Airlines" order for 30 787-10X planes at the end of May. The Paris Airshow is notable for major orders for Boeing and its rivals. Will this week be any different? "When orders are announced it really is more driven by our customers than by us," McNerney says. "Airbus has tended to do very well, though, at air shows in France," he adds, with a smile. Airbus, which with Boeing is part of a long-standing duopoly in the civil aviation market, is owned by EADS, the European aerospace conglomerate that last year tried to merge with the UK's BAE Systems. Was he flattered by the attempts to create a European Boeing with the merger? It's not a matter of flattery. I understand the strategic rationale for it. I also understand some of the difficulties associated with it. That duopoly is beginning to change, albeit slowly. Boeing last week forecast the number of commercial aircraft will double in two decades, with the Asia-Pacific region becoming the focal point. The company has planned for this in part through its links with China, where it has 6,000 staff as part of its operations, ranging from manufacturing to technical centres to service centres. "We have an enormous amount of activity in China," he said. We also spend a lot of time helping China as they stand up and improve their air traffic control system, their pilot training, their biofuel initiative. Boeing is working with COMAC, China's state-owned plane manufacturer. We have to balance co-operative efforts with them, as well as understanding that they will eventually be competitors of ours in this business. China eventually will be a third entry in the commercial airplanes business. As to when that might happen, McNerney is less certain - "whether it's five years or whether it's 15 years I don't know" - but he says that with a large market, technology and financial resources, China has all the qualities that are needed. "Eventually they will become a factor," he acknowledges, albeit over the medium term. For now, McNerney has enough to keep him occupied.