Boeing

Boeing has decided not to pursue a bid for the U.S. Navy’s Undergraduate Jet Training System (UJTS) competition. The company had previously planned to submit a version of the T-7A Red Hawk being built now for the U.S. Air Force. The winning UJTS design will replace the Navy’s T-45 Goshawk jet trainers. The new trainers will become part of a future naval aviation training curriculum for prospective tactical jet pilots that no longer requires carrier qualifications or even simulated touch-and-go carrier landings at bases on land.

The Navy issued a formal request for proposals for UJTS in March. The service currently plans to acquire 216 new jet trainers to replace the just under 200 T-45s that are in its inventory today. With Boeing now out of the running, the Sierra Nevada Corporation (which has now partnered with Northrop Grumman and General Atomics) and a team led by Leonardo and Textron are the only known remaining competitors. Lockheed Martin, which had teamed with Korea Aerospace Industries (KAI), also dropped out back in April. Aviation Week and Breaking Defense were among the first to report on Boeing’s decision regarding UJTS.

“Boeing is focused on meeting our commitments, and we bid for programs where we believe we can provide the right solution tailored to our customers’ needs and requirements,” a Boeing spokesperson told TWZ. “After careful evaluation, we have determined the T-7A does not meet the U.S. Navy’s Undergraduate Jet Training System requirements.”

“We have therefore informed the Navy that we will not bid on the current RFP. We remain committed to delivering the T-7A as a modern, growth-oriented training solution for 4th, 5th and 6th generation pilots as requirements evolve,” they added. “We look forward to providing and sustaining both current and future capabilities for the Navy.”

Boeing says its decision on UJTS is tied to the General Electric F404 turbofan. The company has stressed that the F404 is a proven design with millions of flight hours on multiple platforms, including the T-7A, and is a clear example of a ready-to-field design. Still, Boeing’s view is that the UJTS engine qualification requirements would require additional long-cycle development work, and potentially limit its ability to meet the Navy’s initial operational capability target for the new jet trainers.

All this being said, it is still not entirely clear what the specific issues might be, given that the F404 is such a well-established design that has been and continues to be used on a variety of military aircraft. This includes several other land-based jet trainer designs beyond the T-7, like the Scaled Composites Model 400, which competed against the Red Hawk in the Air Force’s T-X competition, and the Turkish Aerospace Industries Hürjet.

Most notably, the F404 also powers the TF-50N that Lockheed Martin and KAI had put forward for UJTS. At the time of writing, neither Lockheed Martin nor KAI looks to have offered a detailed explanation for the decision to withdraw from the Navy jet trainer competition.

The T-7A has also suffered from various technical and other issues over the course of its development, which has led to significant delays in its entry into Air Force service. The service is now hoping to reach initial operational capability with the Red Hawk next year. Any potential for direct synergies in terms of support and sustainment between the Air Force and Navy jet trainer fleets is now off the table.

It is worth pointing out that the TF-50N and the T-7 are also both single-engine designs. The Beechcraft M-346N that Leonardo and Textron have put forward is powered by a pair of Honeywell F124 turbofans. Two Williams FJ44-4M turbofans power SNC’s Freedom Jet, which is also the only clean-sheet design in the running for UJTS. This may point to a general view of the UJTS requirements that make single-engine designs less attractive.

The Freedom Jet design is also tailored to meet now-axed requirements for UJTS to be able to perform carrier qualifications and simulated carrier touch-and-goes at base on land. The requirements for so-called Field Carrier Landing Practice (FCLP) training at facilities ashore have historically been structured specifically in a way that “simulates, as near as practicable, the conditions encountered during carrier landing operations,” according to the Navy.

F-18 Field Carrier Landing Practice (FCLP). Touch-and-Go Landing.

SNC says its choice to build an aircraft that can still perform these tasks is deliberate, and offers the Navy what could still be important capability and flexibility in the future, as you can read more about here.

The Navy’s decision to remove carrier qualifications and otherwise alter key aspects of the tactical jet aviator training pipeline has been and continues to be controversial. The service has argued that substantial investments in virtualized training and assisted carrier landing capabilities, such as Magic Carpet and its successors, have fundamentally changed the landscape when it comes to training future pilots for carrier-based operations.

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Earlier this month, the Navy also confirmed that it had raised the total cost ceiling for the prospective UJTS contract from approximately $1.8 billion to $2.7 billion.

“The Government updated the price cap to reflect a change in the program cost estimate due to new information received,” Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR) subsequently explained, according to Breaking Defense.

The substantial increase in the projected cost has raised its own questions about the outlook for the competition and the development program that is expected to follow. The Navy’s decisions to scale back its training requirements had previously been seen as opening the door to existing land-based jet trainer designs, or derivatives thereof, like the T-7 and the TF-50N. That, in turn, was viewed as a potential way for the service to help keep costs and risk low.

The Navy’s T-45 replacement plans have already been delayed multiple times, with the service originally planning to pick a winning design this year and to have the first example enter operational service in 2028. The goal now is to award a contract in the middle of next year.

The aging T-45 fleet has faced its own struggles, including a spate of reported hypoxia-like physiological episodes among pilots that led to the development of a new oxygen system. There have been several Goshawk crashes in recent years due to a variety of factors, with the most recent coming just last month. The pilots in that case thankfully survived.

For Boeing, the decision to drop out of the running for UJTS could also allow it to refocus resources to other priorities. The company is also notably one of two remaining competitors vying to build the sixth-generation F/A-XX carrier-based fighter for the Navy. Boeing is already heavily engaged now on work for the F-47 sixth-generation fighter for the Air Force.

When it comes to the UJTS competition, with Boeing having bowed out, the SNC-led and Leonardo/Textron teams are now facing off head-to-head.

Contact the author: joe@twz.com

Operators of the C-17 Globemaster III have been reaching out to Boeing about possibly restarting the product line, and the company has been “encouraged” by these engagements. Separately, Congress recently directed the U.S. Air Force to prepare a formal briefing on the feasibility of acquiring new Globemaster IIIs. The Air Force’s C-17 fleet is critical for U.S. power projection globally. At the same time, a succession of crises in recent years has put serious strain on these aircraft, and questions have already been raised about the viability of the current plan to keep them flying through 2075.

The House Committee on Armed Services added the requirement for the C-17 production restart briefing to a report accompanying the latest draft of the annual defense policy bill, or National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), last week. The Air Force took delivery of its last Globemaster III in 2013, and has some 222 of these airlifters in service today. The air arms of Australia, Canada, India, Kuwait, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, and the United Kingdom also have smaller fleets of these airlifters. Three more of these aircraft are operated under the Strategic Airlift Capability (SAC) initiative, a multi-national arrangement with several European members, as well as the United States. Boeing shuttered the C-17 line entirely in 2015.

Boeing Pieces Together the Last C-17 on the Line

“The committee recognizes that the existing C-17 fleet continues to bear significant operational demands supporting combatant commander requirements, humanitarian assistance missions, and global mobility operations,” the provision in the House Committee on Armed Services’ report notes. “The committee is concerned that future operational demands may place additional strain on the existing C-17 fleet.”

“Therefore, the committee directs the Secretary of the Air Force to provide a briefing to the House Committee on Armed Services not later than March 1, 2027, assessing the feasibility of restarting the production line for the C-17 aircraft,” it adds.

The committee wants the Air Force’s briefing to at least include the following:

• “An assessment of the technical and industrial feasibility of restarting the C-17 production line, including the status of tooling, supplier base viability, workforce availability, and potential reconstitution costs.”
• “An estimate of the timeline required to reestablish production and deliver the first newly produced aircraft.”
• “A cost estimate for restarting the production line and procuring additional aircraft, including options for limited procurement and multi-year procurement.”
• “An evaluation of alternative approaches to increasing strategic airlift capacity, including service life extension programs, modernization of existing aircraft, procurement of commercial derivative cargo aircraft, and expansion of the Civil Reserve Air Fleet.”
• “An assessment of potential international partner interest in participating in or contributing to a restarted production line.”

TWZ subsequently reached out to Boeing to ask about the company’s current position on rebooting C-17 production.

“Our goal is to help our customers be successful, and we work with them to develop innovative solutions to meet their mission needs, including development and production partnerships,” a Boeing spokesperson told us this week. “We are proud of our continued support for the unique, mission-proven capabilities that the C-17 Globemaster III delivers to the U.S. Air Force and eight allied nation partners.”

At the Paris Air Show last year, Turbo Sjogren, Vice President and General Manager of Boeing Global Services-Government Services, had told Shephard Defense that talks with an unnamed country about a possible C-17 production restart were in their “early infancy.”

“It is a very extraordinary effort to do” and is “reflective of the utility of the aircraft,” he also said at the time, according to Shephard.

Boeing has also now said that it is always willing to work to better understand the requirements and needs of its customers. Any talk about the prospect of restarting C-17 production would also have to be viewed in the broader context of the Air Force’s still-evolving requirements for the Next Generation Air Lift (NGAL) program. The service’s current NGAL plans envision a single aircraft replacing the very different C-17 and C-5 Galaxy fleets, as you can read more about here.

TWZ also reached out to the US Air Force about the recently requested briefing.

It is unclear what it might cost to get the C-17 line restarted and what the unit price of these new-production aircraft would be in the end. There are various factors at play, including whether Boeing retains any relevant tooling, the knowledge base of its current workforce, the state of third-party supply chains, and the availability of physical space to build the airplanes. Back in 2019, the company sold off the facilities in Long Beach, California, where it built the original run of Globemaster IIIs.

More than a decade ago, the RAND Corporation did conduct a detailed, independent analysis that explored options for resuming production of the baseline C-17A, a new C-17B, and a significantly revised “fuel efficient” C-17FE derivative.

The C-17B was “a variant Boeing has proposed that adds centerline landing gear, a tire deflation/inflation system, higher-thrust engines, advanced flaps, and an advanced situational awareness and countermeasures system,” according to RAND’s report. The C-17FE derivative “would have a narrower fuselage, up-rated engines, a double-element flap system, winglets, a longer loading ramp, a shorter cargo door, and a modified horizontal tail.”

RAND said that it could cost between $2.1 and $2.7 billion in 2011 dollars to begin making C-17A models again after a pause, depending on how much tooling Boeing retained. Those costs would rise to $4.6 to $6.4 billion for new production of the improved C-17B version, and $6.2 billion to $7 billion to start building the C-17FE derivative. Billions more would be required to actually procure the aircraft, with unit prices being highly dependent on the total size of the production, as outlined in the table below. If nothing else has changed, these cost projections would still be significantly higher today just due to inflation.

As an aside here, RAND published a similar assessment of the options for restarting production of the F-22 Raptor in 2011. That report factored heavily into a study the Air Force subsequently delivered to Congress on that topic back in 2017, which you can read more about here.

Foreign participation in new production of C-17s could help defray costs, and is one of the points the House Armed Services Committee specifically wants the Air Force to address in its briefing. As TWZ noted last year after Turbo Sjogren made comments at the Paris Air Show, Boeing’s discussions at that point might not have been with the U.S. government. Earlier in 2025, then-Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba had expressed interest in buying Globemaster IIIs, raising immediate questions about where those aircraft might come from.

It should be noted here that the U.S. Air Force’s C-17s have received various upgrades over the years, and the service continues to move ahead with other plans to improve their performance and expand their capabilities. This includes the installation of 3D-printed microvanes on the fuselage, which offer a very minor reduction in drag (approximately one percent), but that translates into real reductions in fuel consumption. All Air Force C-17s are expected to have this feature by the end of next year. Communications and data-sharing upgrades have also been a major focus area across all of the Air Force’s airlift and tanker fleets.

Boeing is now under contract for a more extensive upgrade of the flight decks on Air Force C-17s. The company says this will aid in “resolving avionics obsolescence” and integrate new open systems architectures to make it easier to add new and improved capabilities and functionality in the future.

The prospect of a re-engining effort for the Globemaster III fleet has also been raised in the past, but the Air Force downplayed the value of doing so earlier this year.

When it comes to discussions about restarting C-17 production, another key factor is the lack of immediate alternative options. There is really no other aircraft in this class in production now in the United States or anywhere else in the West. Airbus has long positioned its turboprop-powered A400M as sitting in a capability space between Lockheed Martin’s C-130 family and the C-17. Embraer’s KC-390 Millennium design, which is also offered as an aerial refueling tanker, has generally been pitched as a jet-powered competitor to the C-130. China’s Y-20 and Russia’s Il-76 are really the only in-production analogs on any level to the C-17 globally.

The House Armed Services Committee has now also asked the Air Force to speak to the possibility of buying “commercial derivative cargo aircraft” and/or an “expansion of the Civil Reserve Air Fleet,” or CRAF, to help bolster airlift capacity. The CRAF is an arrangement by which the U.S. military can call upon commercial airlines and charter companies to help move cargo and personnel, which you can learn more about here.

A key issue here is that the C-17 is specifically designed for tactical operations right at the tactical edge. This includes the ability to bring combat-ready forces to far-flung locations without the need for an established airfield. Additional commercial alternatives could still be utilized in rear areas to help free up C-17s for more demanding missions and otherwise relieve stress on the Globemaster III fleet.

Questions have been increasingly raised about the survivability of the C-17 itself, especially in the context of a future high-end fight, as the threat ecosystem continues to expand and evolve. The Air Force has made clear that it is working to find new ways to bolster the defensive capabilities of all of its existing airlifters, as well as its tanker fleets, and that this is a key consideration in the evolving NGAL requirements.

TWZ has long been sounding the alarm on the need for more survivable cargo planes and tankers. The Air Force already has decades’ worth of experimental work and studies on concepts for stealthy cargo aircraft and tankers, as well as non-stealthy ones with blended-wing-body (BWB) planforms, under its belt. Over the years, several companies have publicly put forward prospective designs that could be relevant for NGAL, as well.

When any new platform developed under NGAL actually enters service remains to be seen. The stated plan the Air Force has put forward to date would see those new aircraft replacing its C-5s first, with C-17s flying through 2075. By that point, the Globemaster III, as a type, will have been in service for 80 years.

“The C-17 is the most amazing airplane ever made. I have a lot of time in it, so I can say that. We have asked it to do a lot of things, and it’s done more than we ever planned for when we bought that airplane,” Air Force Lt. Gen. Rebecca Sonkiss told TWZ and other outlets at a roundtable on the sidelines of the Air & Space Forces Association’s (AFA) annual Warfare Symposium in February. “It has performed flawlessly, but it’s getting old too.”

Sonkiss is Deputy Commander of Air Mobility Command (AMC). She has been serving as the interim head of the command since her predecessor, Gen. John Lamontagne, became Vice Chief of Staff of the Air Force in January.

“I cannot have a gap in my strategic airlift forces, and we’re working forward on the NGAL to combine the view of the C-5 and the C-17 fleet and figure out what the next strategic airlifter needs to be. That conversation, in my book, can’t happen enough, or can’t happen fast enough,” she added at the roundtable in February. “We have to get after what next looks like, and we can’t wait until we’re shoveling it into the boneyard before we get to that discussion.”

Whether the Air Force’s future airlift plans also include buying new-production C-17s remains to be seen. For its part, Boeing does not appear to have ruled out the possibility just yet.

Contact the author: joe@twz.com

Published on
11/06/2026 – 17:25 GMT+2

German MEP Bernd Lange, chair of the European Parliament’s trade committee, has warned that the long-running Airbus-Boeing dispute could jeopardise the EU-US trade agreement struck last summer if transatlantic tensions flare again in the coming weeks.

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The implementation of the Turnberry Agreement, clinched in July 2025 by US President Donald Trump and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen in Scotland, is entering its final stretch, with EU lawmakers expected to approve it in a vote next Tuesday.

However, the five-year truce between US aerospace giant Boeing and its European rival Airbus over mutual subsidy allegations expires on 11 July, with the Trump administration and the European Commission yet to agree to extend it.

“Will this lead to another escalation? Nobody knows,” Lange, the Parliament’s lead negotiator on the EU-US deal, told journalists on Thursday during a meeting with fellow Socialist lawmakers.

The MEP is concerned that a renewed aerospace dispute could further strain transatlantic trade ties after a year of intense tensions.

“I hope this will not blow up,” Lange told Euronews.

Turnberry deal remains fragile

The battle between Boeing and Airbus dates back more than two decades. The US first brought a case before the World Trade Organization arguing that the EU was illegally subsidising Airbus. Brussels responded with its own complaint, accusing Washington of unlawfully supporting Boeing.

The dispute eventually spiralled into a tariff war, with both sides imposing punitive duties on products ranging from wine and spirits to cheese and tobacco, affecting $11.5 billion worth of trade.

A truce was reached in 2021 under the Biden administration, taking effect on 11 July that year and suspending retaliatory measures for five years. However no extension has been announced since.

“Discussions with the US are ongoing to ensure stability and certainty and to continue the suspension of countermeasures on both sides,” Commission deputy chief spokesperson Olof Gill told Euronews.

In its Trade Policy Agenda 2026, the Trump administration said the US Trade Representative would decide in July “whether to take action in the Section 301 investigation involving the enforcement of US rights in the World Trade Organization disputes involving large civil aircraft”.

The US is able to impose tariffs on trading partners under section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974.

Last week, Washington threatened to impose 10 percent tariffs on EU goods over forced labour following a Section 301 investigation. If implemented, those duties would be added to existing most-favoured-nation tariffs, pushing average US tariffs on EU goods above the 15 percent ceiling agreed under the Turnberry deal.

Under the agreement, which EU lawmakers are expected to adopt next week, the EU committed on its side to eliminate its duties on US goods. However, lawmakers fought hard to include safeguards to protect the deal from future US tariff threats and ensure the 15 percent cap is respected.

The agreement has always appeared fragile. Trump has repeatedly used tariffs as leverage in non-trade disputes, from his push for the acquisition of Greenland earlier this year to his more recent threat to impose 25 percent tariffs on EU cars after German Chancellor Friedrich Merz criticised the war with Iran.

Should the Airbus-Boeing dispute reignite, it could give the US president another pretext to unravel the 2025 agreement.

FORGET going off the grid next time you board a flight, with new designs suggesting entire phone booths could soon be on planes.

Phone booths are quickly becoming a thing of the past across the UK, seeing as most of the population has a mobile phone now.

But Boeing wants to bring them back, this time in plane cabins.

The new designs were revealed in the Aircraft Interiors Expo earlier this month.

The compact booths would be found in economy, with space for a single person to stand or sit.

There would be privacy doors, as well as sound dampeners to avoid you disturbing the other passengers.

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There would even be standing desks so people could work in there too, along with power sockets and coat hooks etc.

The airline manufacturer said it would make the most of unused space in the cabin, and make it easier to stay connected especially on long haul flights.

Boeing chief designer Tom Eaton said it could become more like a “mini office”.

He explained: “A space like this can offer so much versatility to help people communicate and remain connected.

“And it is nice to be in a space where you don’t feel like you’re disrupting people.”

It comes as a number of airlines have started rolling out superfast Starlink onboard.

Virgin Atlantic was the first UK airline to launch Starlink WiFi onboard, followed by British Airways.

Emirates confirmed last year that they were rolling out the Starlink WiFi this year, along with Qatar Airways.

The Sun’s Assistant Travel Editor Sophie Swietochowski recently tried it out for herself.

She said: “I didn’t need to pay a penny extra to use it on board my British Airways plane – nor will any other customers.

“The new WiFi model operates differently to its current one. On its typical internet-enabled aircrafts, passengers currently have to create a British Airways account in order to gain access to free messaging services, but that’s not the case for its Starlink aircrafts – a simple click of a button will get you online in seconds.

“Downloading your Netflix shows ahead of travel will become a thing of the past, with high speed streaming enabled, and pre-ordering your Uber ahead of landing will make the overall process of travelling much smoother.

“Personally, I’m most pleased that I could catch up on boring home and work admin, so that it didn’t eat into time in my holiday destination.”

The Aircrafts Interior Expo also had a number of other interesting cabin designs.

There is the newest iteration of the double decker economy seats, which were first revealed back in 2020.

A unique business class seat was also revealed, which had a wraparound TV more like a surround sound cinema.