When we think of Lean Agile ways of working we tend to think of digital offerings, and smaller applications at that. We don’t really think of hardware, and certainly not gargantuan manufacturing tasks like building an airliner. But as anyone who was consulted in lean agile ways of working will attest, the principles are the same for a 7-person team as they are for a 7000 strong engineering division – the are just scaled.

But therein lies the problem. Scaling is hard. Scaling on hardware and cyber physical programs is harder still. There are multiple reasons for this. You can amend digital code in minutes, you can’t rebuild a wing section in minutes. You can rebrand your entire digital offering to the outside world in a few days. It takes 2 weeks to paint one plane …and you may have 100 of them. This is stating the obvious, but you get the point.

When we talk about Product augmentation, we are talking about how to tailor and refine your product to best suit your customer. This comes from feedback and external factors. In the case of aviation some of the biggest external factors are oil prices and noise limits at urban airports. Manufactories can address these issues, technically most things are possible in the engineering realm, the trick is doing it so the product is viable – profit margins are important.

I think Airbus has managed this better than Boeing. We can debate the 777x program another day as have lots of comments on that.  Airbus has been doing this via its NEO (new engine option) program. This is nothing new and has been going since 2014. The most successful variant has unquestionable been the A320 NEO. In the case of the A320 NEO the changes are pretty much two-fold, new engines and an updated wing tip, or Sharklet as Airbus marketing team have called them. No new fancy cabin layout, no more cargo space, no revolution change in avionics. Just different engines and a funny looking wing tip. But these changes are exactly what the customers wanted. Let me explain.

The A320neo brings minimum change with maximum benefit through the availability of two advanced engine choices – Pratt & Whitney’s PurePower PW1100G-JM geared turbofan, and CFM International’s LEAP-1A. Both these engines provide far better operational, economic, and environmental performance then their predecessors.
 
Also included on the A320neo are Airbus’ Sharklets, which were pioneered on the A320ceo version. The 2.4-metre-tall wingtip devices are standard on NEO aircraft, and result in up to 4% reduced fuel burn over longer sectors, corresponding to an annual reduction in CO2 emissions of around 900 tonnes per aircraft. The Sharklets are incorporated on new build aircraft, but can also be retrofitted on the earlier A320ceo jetliners. The newer engines cannot be viably retro fitted.
 

Overall, the A320neo delivers 20% fuel savings and CO2 reduction compared to previous-generation Airbus aircraft. For COOs and CFOs they cannot get their company cheques books out quick enough. You get extra benefits without having to completely re-certify crew on a new aircraft. The A320Neo was and still is a huge success for carriers the world over.

But this isn’t a guaranteed pattern that you can simply apply to your entire range and expect the same success. The A330neo program, whilst has had reasonable uptake, hasn’t really seen the success the Airbus was after. The ultimate test will be to see what Airbus is going to do with the A350. The A350 is currently the jewel in their crown and is a favourite long range wide body amongst its customers. As a direct rival to Boeing 787 any increase in the already great product good reaffirm Airbus as the market leader over the next decade.

Version updates on products are nothing new. Car manufactures do it all the time with LCI (Life Cycle Impluse) udpates. But again there are good and bad examples of this. BMW are great at this, look at the recent 3 series and X7 LCI updates. And in some cases the LCI updates are to most customers a new model – even though the actually new model may be 2 years down the line. It’s a great way to refresh the brand and adapt to new features that are hitting the market. Porsche is another excellent example with their 991.2 updates ahead of the full new 911 release later in 2025.

There is still a lead time to all this work. You can’t add touch screen displays and self-driving in a few days – these updates still need months and months of planning. The obvious exception being Tesla where you have a digital product with wheels. With the over the air updates only limited by the imagination and current vehicle regulations imposed by different countries.

The take-away here is that when we are working with our clients and customers to design products, we need to be looking for the earliest opportunity to augment our products to best suit customer needs. Even if our product has a 10year lead time like building a new airliner model. Will our customers wait another 10 years for their feedback to be actioned – or will they just buy from a competitor?

Let me know your thoughts on this. And if you do need any product help on turning the above into a reality reach out for a chat.

regards

Adam