Richard Aboulafia Quotations

We have no idea how the market for very light jets will look in 25 years from now. There are several players trying to get into this market, but we really don't know what the market wants yet.

No one was told that there was a choice between Iraq and recapitalizing the nation's military.

If these trends continue, it's going to be 60-40 in favor of Boeing ( BA ) by the end of the decade, and there's even a possibility of a two-thirds, one-third split.

If they do this right, they are golden for a long time.

I don't know which is more bloated, the production expectations or the demand expectations.

Basically, we're going to either have a hollow force or a truncated force structure -- the message here is that we couldn't really afford Iraq and our current military. If Boeing and Lockheed Martin aren't thinking like that in public, they are in private.

If Boeing does cave and give them something like what they want, it will be a bit of a hollow victory because in the long run it will probably result in increased outsourcing.

If Airbus can't get a key A340 victory soon, there will be serious questions about that program.

There is a good chance that there will be Dubai bashing and xenophobia in Congress. That could help poison commercial relations, and I would hope that calmer heads will prevail.

Keeping costs down and getting close to the customer makes an awful lot of sense when the revenue environment is flattening.

It has a big feel in a regional jet.

I think the smart money is on smaller, simpler drones and the operating systems that make them effective. That's where Lockheed is well positioned to add value.

Reinforcing their traditional businesses -- regional jets and corporate jets -- makes a lot of sense. It's familiar turf, they know the customers, and there's much less risk than trying to attack a market that's got two entrenched competitors.

The analysis of alternatives did nothing more than endorse the very concept of the obvious.

You can explain this. But people see what they want to see.

While a strike of a couple of weeks might be doable, some kind of accommodation would have to be reached. If Boeing does cave and give them something like what they want, it will be a bit of a hollow victory because in the long run it will probably result in increased outsourcing.

The fact that the Chinese government is placing these orders shows how close they are.

The only thing worse than cannibalizing your own market is having your competitor do it.

Both sides can claim victory. It looks like a reasonable compromise.

Boeing has all the blue chip orders. Airbus only has 100 orders for the A350.

These moves get them closer to the customer. And the customer that counts is in Washington.

Right now things are good, but there's not enough permanent linkage to establish a trend.

The one thing that gives (the union) that power is that outsourcing jobs takes a lot of time, but if you make life very difficult for the manufacturer these jobs are leaving,

The money makes no material difference to either side -- there is no reason for this strike to be happening.

A new CEO, a new approach to doing business, and clear up this kind of unfinished business -- that's the strategy here, ... It's a steep price to pay, but markets hate uncertainty. It's a price worth paying for Boeing.

You're tapping in to the most promising revenue stream in the world.

You're putting a lot of Canadian content in this plane, which means if it fails, much of Canada's aerospace industry really feels that pain, and perhaps fails with it.

The upturn looks pretty solid and consistent for the next year or two. Beyond that, there are certainly valid questions, certainly about the strength of the domestic market. Until then, it looks solid.

The up-front costs to develop the BBJ were relatively light, and some were shared with important military programs, most notably the E-737 AWACS and MMA P-8. Those military programs alone make the effort worthwhile.

They're talking about two different kinds of airplanes. One is far more of a logistical aircraft and the other is far more of a combat aircraft.

They seem to have made a good institutional comeback. The survival has had its priorities, and they're in no better or worse shape than the other services.

The requirement is strong. The budget dismal. That adds up to possible but not likely.

There's a tremendous crunch on the way. Every aircraft now in production is under threat.

It's a relatively inconsequential cost increase from the corporate perspective. From the union side, they got better than Boeing's best offer.

It's more about service, information and customer relations than metal- bending. It's also a fragmented market, ripe for consolidation.

That implies that they want to keep this going as long as possible.

Nevertheless, ... it was financially clearly in Boeing's best interest to settle.

It's very tough to pass on higher costs to the nation's airlines.

Not to say, 'Hurray, we all win!' but both sides can claim victory.

It helps box the A380 into an even smaller niche,

Chapter 11 has come to mean that you can ignore the demands of pension-fund people, for instance, and still stay in business without a fundamental rethink of your strategy.

The Marines staked everything on the Osprey and won.

The type of lift they're talking about is the kind you buy on FedEx. It's not combat lift.

These guys are basically taking oil money and trying to convert it into a long-term value-added business. That's not dumb.

This is a good way to address the shrinking number of dollars out there in the defense business. The defense game is definitely changing.

Airbus really wants to get an order out of Aeroflot and appears to be losing to Boeing. There's a real concern the Russian aviation market might just close up again so Airbus wants to have a presence on the inside.

You've got a situation where Airbus is coming perilously close to being Boeing's equal. This was never seen before.

The Chinese like to shop on both sides of the street.

All the lenders gave better terms because they felt they would not be the last people to get paid