Boeing will start running its new 737 MAX production line in Everett on July 6, CEO Kelly Ortberg said Friday.
The new production line, Boeing’s fourth for its narrowbody plane, will take MAX production beyond the company’s Renton facility and allow the manufacturer to continue churning out more MAX planes every month.
Boeing currently runs three MAX lines in Renton and is in the process of increasing production rates from 42 to 47 planes per month. In May, the Federal Aviation Administration approved that production rate increase after a so-called capstone review to determine whether Boeing could safely increase the production rate without risking the quality and safety of each plane.
The regulator capped Boeing's MAX production after a nearly catastrophic midair panel blowout in January 2024. The jump from 42 to 47 would mark Boeing's second rate increase since the incident.
Boeing executives have said before that they expect the Everett line, known as the North Line, will be up and running this summer. But Ortberg's comments Friday during an interview with CNBC offer the most specific start date yet.
The plane-maker and the Everett community have been waiting for the opening day since 2023, when Boeing first announced its plans to open a fourth MAX line in its largest manufacturing facility.
On Friday, Ortberg said Boeing would load the first plane on the North Line on July 6. The new production line is a “carbon copy” of the existing lines running in Renton, Ortberg said Friday.
Last year, Ortberg said the new production line would likely focus on building the largest MAX variant, the MAX 10. That variant, which has yet to be certified by the FAA, has the “most complexity” and will require a lower rate of production, Ortberg said at the time. Clearing the MAX 10 to the North Line will allow the other three production lines to continue moving at the faster clip.
The North Line is still equipped to build the MAX 8 and 9, Boeing has said.
Boeing doesn’t need the new line for its current rate increase, from 42 to 47, but will rely on the extra capacity for future rate increases, Ortberg has said.
On Friday, he told CNBC that the company expects to continue increasing MAX production rates, at least to a rate of 63 planes per month while studying the possibility of going even further. That confirms a report from trade publication The Air Current that said Boeing was exploring a higher rate increase, getting closer to the production cadence of its European rival Airbus.
