Boeing reports a $0.561 billion loss and a 10% fall in revenue for the first quarter of 2021, most of it due to lower 787 deliveries.
Another major cause for the poor performance was the lower volume of commercial services, partially offset by higher 737 deliveries and KC-46A tanker revenue, the report states.
“I am proud of the progress our global team made across our business in the first quarter as we continued to transform our enterprise, strengthen our safety processes, and sustain critical investments for our future,” Boeing President and CEO Dave Calhoun is quoted in the press release.
Calhoun praised the company’s vaccination efforts through the quarter, and said that they view 2021 as a key inflection point towards the recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic.
Despite the yearly decrease in revenue, the company managed to reduce the loss from operations to $83 million from $1,353 million in 1Q20, and the net loss of 1Q21 was $80 million lower than in 1Q20.
Boeing delivered 77 aircraft in the first quarter of 2021, 54% more than in the same quarter of 2020.
The company demonstrated a strong start of 2021 overall, for example in February it finally surpassed Airbus in deliveries, as the production of the troubled Boeing 737 MAX steadily increased.
Despite that, the company encountered numerous problems with another of its products, the 787. The Dreamliner was plagued by a plethora of problems through 2020, stalling deliveries of the wide-body jet for almost half a year.