GoldCare Enhances 787 Lifecycle Value

GoldCare is Boeing's comprehensive life-cycle management service, specially developed for the 787 Dreamliner. It offers airlines a new strategic business model for acquiring, operating, and transitioning their fleets.

Under GoldCare, Boeing leads and integrates a global team of partners specializing in maintenance, engineering, and spares logistics. GoldCare services are tightly integrated into the operational processes and business model of each airline. Airlines pay an agreed-upon per-flight-hour price, which makes many of the costs of running an airline predictable and responsive to the airline’s activity and revenue cycles.

GoldCare frees airlines to focus on their passengers and core business activities, with the confidence that the airline can count on optimum dispatch readiness and maximum airplane utilization.

Far beyond being a services integration program, GoldCare leverages the Dreamliner’s technical innovation to reduce airline operating costs and enhance the airplane’s residual value – which could facilitate advantageous financing.

According to Bob Avery, Boeing’s vice president of 787 Support & Services, there is a strong trend for airlines to use the most efficient maintenance and support providers. In addition, airlines are already looking to Boeing to provide business solutions that integrate technical support services and harness Boeing’s industry-scale purchasing and contracting advantages to reduce costs. The technical innovation of the 787 gives Boeing an unprecedented opportunity to integrate its established services capabilities with the expertise of Boeing’s global partners.

Boeing welcomed its first three supplier partners to its GoldCare team in July. SR Technics was named GoldCare’s first maintenance provider partner, while Smiths Aerospace and Hamilton Sundstrand are the first component suppliers to sign on. More supplier partners will be announced this year.

Getting these highly respected providers integrated into GoldCare strengthens the service and signals to customers that GoldCare will be ready to go to work well before they receive their first 787s.

GoldCare builds on the experience that Boeing has gained in the commercial aviation services market. GoldCare benefits directly from the success of offerings such as the Integrated Materials Management program, which guarantees parts availability and reduces spares inventories for nine customers, including Japan Airlines, All Nippon Airlines, Delta, and AirTran –- and Airplane Health Management, which enables customers, including Air New Zealand, Cathay Pacific, Etihad, Japan Airlines and Singapore Airlines, to predict airplane maintenance requirements and to schedule service to optimize airplane availability and avoid airline schedule disruptions.

GoldCare smooths the peaks and valleys of ownership costs (blue), making costs more predictable (gold). Availability and reliability are guaranteed. Total maintenance costs are significantly reduced (gold bar) compared to traditional maintenance programs (red bar).

The reception of the GoldCare financial story has been very positive because GoldCare keeps a digital record of the airplane’s maintenance and operational history. This reduces the time it takes and the cost to transition airplanes to the next owner. For leasing companies and financiers, that’s a huge area of uncertainty and cost that GoldCare can minimize, making the 787 an even more valuable asset.

This type of lifecycle support was pioneered by aircraft engine manufacturers over recent years with great success. Boeing is now, for the first time, extending the convenience and economy of lifecycle support at the airframe level with the Dreamliner. Boeing is confident that this revolutionary new business model can help airline owners or operators become lower cost carriers.