Marian Lockhart/Boeing/Handout via REUTERS; Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
- Boeing's new CEO, Kelly Ortberg, received praise from Scott Kirby, boss of United Airlines.
- Kirby, a vocal critic of Boeing after January's blowout, said he was confident in the firm's recovery.
- United is Boeing's biggest customer in commercial aviation, so Kirby's endorsement is a big boost.
Boeing's new chief is already receiving plaudits from other industry leaders.
United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby praised Kelly Ortberg in a Thursday LinkedIn post, adding that the pair had lunch together earlier in the week.
Kirby said he "came away with a renewed confidence that Boeing is on the right path and will recover faster than most expect."
As the boss of the airline that uses more Boeing planes than any other, Kirby has been outspoken about the planemaker's problems in the wake of January's Alaska Airlines blowout.
For example, later that month, he said United would look for alternatives to the 737 Max 10 after the blowout compounded frustrations with delays.
In June, Kirby criticized Boeing's 737 Max, as it was based on the original 737 model that was first built in the 1960s instead of creating a new aircraft.
Shortly before Ortberg's predecessor Dave Calhoun announced his resignation, Kirby and three other airline CEOs met with Boeing's board, The Wall Street Journal reported.
Just a week into his time at the helm, Ortberg has received a noteworthy boost with Kirby's endorsement.
Kirby cheered the fact that the new Boeing boss has an engineering background — something many customers had hoped for given the planemaker's well-documented quality-control problems in recent years.
By contrast, Calhoun worked in finance, but his own predecessor, Dennis Muilenburg, was an engineer. Muilenburg was fired in 2019 amid the previous 737 Max crisis.
Kirby also applauded Ortberg for his plans to be based in Seattle, Boeing's historic home. The planemaker was founded there in 1916, but in 2001, it moved its headquarters to Chicago and then to Virginia in 2022.
That distance between the corporate headquarters and the factories has been criticized, with critics saying it led to profits and production speed taking precedence over quality.
"Boeing's 170,000+ employees have the expertise, drive, and commitment to get the company back to being one of the best and most important brands in the world," Kirby wrote.
"And Kelly is the right leader to take them there," he added.