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The projected launch cost of the 7J7 is so enormous--$10 billion--that not even Boeing can go it alone. To keep its exposure to between $1 billion and $3 billion, the company has taken the unprecedented step of seeking foreign investment. A consortium of Japanese firms has already agreed to kick in as much as $1 billion for 25% of the project.
The development of the 7J7 will be the responsibility of Frank Shrontz, 54, who became chief executive last month. A Harvard M.B.A., Shrontz will need all his financial skills to guide Boeing in the new era of $10 billion airplanes. To reduce the company's dependence on the volatile commercial-jet market, he intends to continue increasing business with the military and to lead Boeing into the high-profit fields of aerospace electronics and computer systems. He insists, however, that "what we know best is commercial aircraft, and we will stick with it."
Supreme as Boeing's reputation is, it is also fragile. On those very rare occasions when a Boeing jet crashes, a shudder not only of sympathy but of concern goes through Seattle. When a Japan Air Lines 747 went down last year, killing 520, the company sent a twelve-member team of investigators to the scene. Boeing later admitted that repair work it had once done on the plane's tail area had been faulty.
The tragedy shocked Boeing's employees. But it also seemed to redouble their determination to build the best and safest possible planes. Just ask workers like young Ellis Clark's dad Stanley, who installs 737 flight-control cables. Says he: "I watch something come in one door as thousands of parts and roll out the other door as a ready-to-fly airplane. There's a great satisfaction to that. I can say, 'That baby is mine.' "