Boeing pitching 787s to Qantas today

Published 9:00 pm Wednesday, October 5, 2005

Boeing’s vice president of sales, marketing and 787 customer support, Martin Bentrott, is Down Under for a two-day meeting with Qantas about that potential mega-order, the Australian Associated Press reports http://www.theadvertiser.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5936,16832623%255E462,00.html .

Key Quote (from Bentrott): “‘The plane is designed to bring a new level of efficiency … both in terms of savings and fuel which is a big cost driver right now. In fact, as we were talking with Qantas, fuel price alone represents a quarter of their overall operating cost, so it is a big influencing factor.’ “

And in other news relating to Boeing sales pitches, the Connexion team is trying to drum up business in India, Business Standard http://www.business-standard.com/common/storypage.php?storyflag=y&leftnm=lmnu1&leftindx=1&lselect=1&chklogin=N&autono=202297 reports from Seattle. (Boeing has brought in a bunch of Asian journalists to tour Puget Sound facilities this week.)

Key Quote: “Connexion director (strategy and business development) Beverly M Wyse said a team from the company had met top officials of Air-India and Jet Airways. Boeing had also flown down one of its Internet-enabled planes to Delhi and demonstrated its wireless fidelity (Wi-Fi) capabilities to the carriers.”

And as Airbus launches the A350, Boeing tries to deflect a little attention by talking up its proposed 747 Advanced, Reuters notes, http://today.reuters.com/business/newsArticle.aspx?type=ousiv&storyID=2005-10-06T151537Z_01_MOR654956_RTRIDST_0_BUSINESSPRO-BA-TRANSPORT-BOEING-DC.XML , following an interview with the Blogger-in-chief.

Key Quote: “‘We’ve got a number of airlines that are very interested and we hope to have something soon on that (the official launch),’ Randy Baseler, vice president of marketing for Boeing commercial airplanes, said in a conference call.”