In passing, it is keeping its flag planted in a market in which it has 50 years experience but hasn't built a jet-powered transport in more than 15 years. It's time now to start thinking about requirements, he said, since the process from concept to fielding takes about 13-15 years. Not that the development cycle for the next airplane will take that long, he added. He expects it to be cut in half - with the requirements approved in 2006 and the new airplane fielded in 2015.
Modular design is the enabler, though some scoff at it as too difficult.
Besides affordability, continental US basing, and nontraditional missions, a 30-percent reduction in research and development costs is a given. This has a platform like a parallelogram. Wing rigidity permits the mounting of multiple refueling booms for the kind of simultaneous hook-ups foreseen in the next century. In addition, it has a very small ground footprint for high cargo capacity. But it faces stability challenges.