Insider Monkey

Top 16 Aircraft Manufacturers In The World

Ramish Cheema
10 min read

In This Article:

In this piece, we will take a look at the top 16 aircraft manufacturers in the world. If you want to skip our introduction to the global aircraft industry and the latest trends, then you can take a look at the Top 5 Aircraft Manufacturers In The World.

The aircraft industry, just like consumer technology, has been making a lot of news over the past couple of months. This is because, at least when the Western world is concerned, there are only two primary aircraft manufacturing companies whose jets are capable of supporting large scale commercial operations. These are the U.S. aerospace giant The Boeing Company. (NYSE:BA) and its European counterpart Airbus SE (EPA:AIR.PA). Together, the duo dominates the industry for commercial aviation that is led globally by players the likes of Delta Air Lines, Inc. (NYSE:DAL) and United Airlines Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:UAL).

What this means is that aircraft manufacturing has to be precisely managed and carefully monitored to ensure that the stringent requirements of a large tube of aluminum traveling at more than half the speed of sound at thousands of feet in the air are met. On this front, the global aviation industry was shocked when a Boeing 737 Max aircraft's door blew out while it was cruising at altitude. Well, what blew out wasn't technically a door. Instead, it was a door plug that budget airlines use to make room for extra seats, and subsequent investigations revealed that a refurbishment oversight had led to the plug missing crucial bolts that would have held it in place.

For Boeing stock, the news naturally wasn't greeted well by investors who had already stood by the firm during its recent lowest after crashes that claimed the lives of hundreds of people. The stock is down 18.8% year to date, even while its European rival's shares have appreciated by more than 5% this year so far. The nature of the aviation industry means that since Boeing supplies a substantially larger number of aircraft to airlines than it would have had there been multiple other manufacturers when its production lines stopped due to industry scares or inspection requirements, the impact is significant.

In the aftermath of the 737 Max incident, the company shared the impact of the pressurization it faced from regulators and customers in February. Boeing outlined that its aircraft deliveries had shrunk by a third in January, and led the firm to deliver 27 airplanes in January. Had the 737 Max incident not occurred, then Boeing's deliveries might have sat at 38 planes - a fact that underscores the potential impact on a quarterly income statement from a handful of bolts and a lack of oversight. This is particularly painful for Boeing, an established stock that does not pay dividends since it stopped them in the aftermath of the coronavirus pandemic.

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