Spirit AeroSystems & Boeing
Boeing reacquired Spirit AeroSystems' fuselage manufacturing operations in 2025, reversing the 2005 spinoff. Spirit manufactures 737 fuselage sections that were central to Boeing's 2024 quality crisis, including the door plug blowout on an Alaska Airlines 737 MAX 9 in January 2024. Bringing Spirit back in-house gives Boeing direct quality control over the most critical aircraft structure.
Why it matters: The January 2024 Alaska Airlines incident exposed systemic quality problems in Spirit's fuselage manufacturing. Reacquiring Spirit eliminates the arm's-length supplier relationship that Boeing management cited as contributing to quality degradation and gives Boeing direct oversight of its highest-volume aircraft body production.