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New York (CNN) — Elon Musk stopped by the operations of his competitor Boeing to look into the long-delayed efforts to renovate two 747 jets into the next generation of Air Force One jets, Boeing CEO Kelly Ortberg said Tuesday.
In an interview with CNBC to discuss another disastrous quarter for Boeing financial results, Ortberg said the company talked with Musk – CEO of both Tesla and Boeing competitor SpaceX – as well as with the Air Force about what to do to speed up deliveries of the jets that originally were supposed to be delivered by 2022 but now aren’t expected until at least 2027, according to reports. Boeing won’t confirm a new delivery date, saying it is in discussions with Air Force.
“The president wants the airplane sooner, and so we’re working with Elon and the team to figure what can we do to pull up the schedule of that aircraft,” Ortberg said on CNBC. He called the talks with Musk “constructive.”
“They sincerely are looking at things in the contract or in the process that are slowing us down that are not providing value,” he said.
Although Musk’s December 18 visit to Boeing was previously reported, Ortberg’s statement that the company continues to work with Musk was new.
Ortberg said he has also spoken with President Donald Trump. “He’s keenly focused on American jobs,” he told CNBC. “We build these planes in the US, and we export them throughout the world. So, I think the administration is going to be very supportive, not just of Boeing, but of all the aerospace industry.”
But in a call with investors later in the morning Ortberg said that there was “no silver bullet” for the Air Force One program, technically known as VC-25B. Air Force One is the designation only when the president is on board a plane.
“I do feel better about our ability to better manage the performance in 2025,” Ortberg said.
Musk, as head of a Department of Government Efficiency or DOGE, is tasked with eliminating wasteful government spending. Although the two Air Force One jets are more than $1 billion over budget each, those cost will fall on Boeing, not taxpayers, as part of fixed price contracts under which the Air Force will pay $3.9 billion for the two planes.
Delays during the pandemic limited staffing at the Texas facility where security features required by the Air Force were being added to the 747 jets. Problems in Boeing’s supply chain also pushed the delivery time frame back. Already, Boeing has identified $2.25 billion in losses for the two jets in previous financial results, and on Tuesday took another $1.7 billion charge for military contracts, including the VC-25B, although it did not break out how much of that cost came on the Air Force One jets.
Boeing losses continue to climb
The latest $1.7 billion in charges for military contract losses was only part of Boeing’s problems as it reported on Tuesday a core operating loss of $4 billion the quarter, much higher than had been forecast by analysts. Among the problems was a strike from mid-September through early November that shut down production of most of its commercial jets for three months as it took a month after the strike for the assembly of jets to resume. Its orders and deliveries plunged in the quarter and for the full year.
The fourth quarter results brought its full-year loss to $11.8 billion, just below the record net loss of $11.9 billion it reported in 2020 when its bestselling plane, the 737 Max, was still grounded after fatal crashes in 2018 and 2019 that killed 346 people, and the pandemic had caused massive losses across the global airline industry that makes up most of Boeing’s customer base.
Boeing has not reported an annual profit since 2018 and the latest loss brought its cumulative core operating losses to $51.1 billion, by far the biggest losses reported by any company over that time.
And the losses are likely to continue this year. While Boeing is no longer giving guidance on earnings and losses, it did say it expects to spend more cash than it takes in during the course of 2025. The best that Ortberg could offer investors on his call Tuesday is expects that cash burn to be “a significant improvement” from the $12 billion it burned through last year.
The-CNN-Wire
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