McDonnell Douglas May Take on Work for Boeing

Faced with an onslaught of new orders, Boeing Co. said Wednesday that it is in talks with less-fortunate McDonnell Douglas Corp. to get some help building airplanes.

“We have a lot on our plates. We have the work and they have the resources,” Boeing spokeswoman Janice Hayes said from company headquarters in Seattle.

She said the company was looking at a wide range of areas where McDonnell Douglas could help its commercial aircraft efforts. The Long Beach Press-Telegram reported Wednesday that McDonnell Douglas might build a larger version of the Boeing 767, a two-engine wide-body plane that carries about 250 passengers. Hayes said the talks were exploratory.

The newspaper also said the first project Douglas might do for Boeing would be to design the tail section for a new, larger version of the 747 jumbo jet. Other work could include painting planes in Long Beach and sending Douglas workers to Seattle for specific projects, the newspaper said.

The newspaper said that by taking on work for Boeing, McDonnell Douglas would be able to keep its Southern California work force busy until its own business picks up. St. Louis-based McDonnell Douglas employs more than 15,000 at its facilities in Long Beach and Huntington Beach.

Shares of McDonnell Douglas rose 12.5 cents to $52.50, and Boeing stock gained 37.5 cents to $99.625. Both trade on the New York Stock Exchange.CQ

Boeing has a backlog of 1,287 commercial planes on order, compared with a backlog of 1,079 a year ago. The company has also been developing new versions of its jets and absorbing Rockwell International’s defense and space unit, which it bought earlier this year.

McDonnell Douglas hasn’t been as busy.

A distant third in the commercial aircraft business behind Boeing and Europe’s Airbus Industrie, McDonnell hasn’t seen the huge influx of orders that its rivals have, in part because it doesn’t offer a full family of various-sized aircraft.

McDonnell Douglas got more bad news on Wednesday when a Delta Air Lines executive said that it may get rid of smaller jetliners built by McDonnell Douglas Corp. and replace them with planes built by the Airbus Industrie consortium.

Earlier this month, both Delta and American Airlines said they would not consider McDonnell Douglas planes for other orders valued together at $9 billion.

McDonnell Douglas recently decided against building a new jumbo jet that had been dubbed the MD-XX. The company also lost out in the competition to build the military’s next fighter jet.

Plane builders frequently supply parts to other companies that design and assemble aircraft. Los Angeles-based Northrop Grumman Corp., for example, is a subcontractor on Boeing 747 jetliners.