Boeing Sees Costs From Delayed Space Taxi
October 11 2016 - 1:16PM
Dow Jones News
By Doug Cameron and Andy Pasztor
Boeing Co. said Tuesday that it has delayed the first manned
flight of its new space taxi for the second time this year and
could take a financial charge against the program as early as its
third-quarter results.
The company has pushed back the first crewed flight of its
CST-100 Starliner capsule by another six months to mid-2018 because
of supplier and technical issues and said there were cost
implications to the move.
A Boeing spokesman declined to quantify the potential
amount.
The potential charge would upset analysts' expectations for
Boeing to have a "clean" third-quarter earnings report on Oct. 26.
The company has taken a succession of charges against its military
tanker program and the 747-8 jumbo jet because of design problems
and slow sales, respectively.
Boeing and Elon Musk's Space Exploration Technologies Corp. are
vying to be the first to resume crewed flights with U.S. spacecraft
since the end of the space shuttle program in 2011. The Starliner
was originally due to fly with crew by the end of next year, but
Boeing defense and space chief Leanne Caret revealed at its
investor day in May that this would slip into 2018, with the
company later flagging February as the likely first date.
Boeing said technical issues would push back the first unmanned
flight to June 2018, with a crewed flight following in August.
The new delay was first reported by Aviation Week.
Boeing's admission of a further delay comes weeks after a
government agency warned that both Boeing and SpaceX would likely
have to push back their first crewed flights. The Office of
Inspector General last month said any delays could force the
National Aeronautics and Space Administration to buy more seats on
Russian Soyuz flights to and from the International Space
Station.
Boeing in 2014 received a contract worth as much as $4.2 billion
for its capsule, with SpaceX winning a separate pact valued at up
to $2.6 billion to develop, test and fly space taxis to carry U.S.
astronauts into orbit.
Write to Doug Cameron at doug.cameron@wsj.com and Andy Pasztor
at andy.pasztor@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
October 11, 2016 13:01 ET (17:01 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2016 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
Boeing (NYSE:BA)
Historical Stock Chart
From Mar 2024 to Apr 2024
Boeing (NYSE:BA)
Historical Stock Chart
From Apr 2023 to Apr 2024
