By David Shepardson
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Boeing Co delivered 480 airplanes and won 774 net new orders after allowing for cancellations in 2022 after a strong December performance, the U.S. planemaker said Tuesday.
Last month, Boeing delivered 69 airplanes, including 53 737 MAX planes and 15 widebody airplanes and booked 203 new orders net of cancellations.
Airbus had delivered 563 airplanes by the end of November, meaning the European group remains the world’s largest planemaker for the fourth year running.
Boeing in all of 2021 delivered 340 planes and reported 479 net new orders.
Boeing said its official backlog as of Dec. 31 rose to 4,578 airplanes including 3,628 737 MAX airplanes. About 80% of its deliveries in 2022 were for 737s.
Boeing’s 2022 deliveries included 31 787 Dreamliners, including 10 handed over in December.
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) in August approved the first 787 for delivery since 2021. Boeing halted deliveries in May 2021 after the FAA raised concerns about its proposed inspection method.
Last month, President Joe Biden signed legislation that lifted a Dec. 27 deadline imposing a new safety standard for modern cockpit alerts for the MAX 7 and MAX 10 – two new versions of the U.S. planemaker’s best-selling 737 MAX.
Without action by Congress, the two new MAX variants would need modern cockpit alerting systems to be certified by the FAA, which Boeing had warned could jeopardize the futures of the airplanes. Boeing has more than 1,000 orders for the two MAX variants.
The planemaker in November delivered 48 airplanes and had just 21 new orders, consisting of 18 737 MAXs and three 767s. Boeing said in November a decline in 737 MAX deliveries was the result of its quality management system catching “a defect in the fuselage, two defects and delayed deliveries.”
Boeing Commercial Airplanes CEO Stan Deal told reporters last month that issue had been addressed. “Those are the kind of things that slow your pace down. That’s why we keep saying quality number one, keep the focus there,” Deal said.
Last month, United Airlines said it was ordering 100 787s and 100 737 MAXs. Boeing said Tuesday that 10 MAX and 10 787 orders were previously listed as unidentified orders.
(Reporting by David Shepardson; Editing by Mark Potter)
