A New York Times article (January 27,2011, B3) quotes executives at Boeing being optimistic that production of Dreamliners can be ramped up significantly over the next three years. The company claims that problems for the first few planes were due to poorly made parts by suppliers, but that the problem was resolved and that the assembly line was now stable.  They also claim that the delays had been built in to plans and that the expectation was that production could ramp up earlier than intended.  Given that Boeing has already generated a three year delay, are such predictions credible ? Can we look at the suppliers to Boeing and their predictions of volume to estimate whether these claims could be achieved ? Shouldn’t the expected issues of new product introduction and supplier impacts have been incorporated into launch plans, or was Boeing compelled to speed up predicted launch to match its competitor, Airbus ?