CHARLESTON, United States: The sparkling new Boeing 787s bound for China Southern Airlines and Air China are waiting to be delivered, but the prospect of a trade war could make for a less rosy future.

At this Boeing manufacturing plant in Charleston, South Carolina — which President Donald Trump visited a year ago to cries of “God Bless Boeing” — the trade battle he unleashed with Beijing last week is far off.

Or so it seems. Like the company itself, workers at the plant, which produces the Boeing 787 and where unions have struggled to organise the labour force, say little when the question comes up.

But the threat of losing export markets is still clear and present.

“Unfortunately, Boeing makes an easy target for anyone wishing to retaliate against the new US trade measures,” Richard Aboulafia, vice-president of analysis at Teal Group, told AFP.

A flagship of US industry and one of the best known American brands, the company says it is the largest US exporter because about 80 per cent of its planes are for export.

As a result, any trade major conflict would leave the company dangerously exposed — in particular one involving the world’s fastest growing aviation market in China.

Boeing was one of the first companies Trump attacked on Twitter, when he threatened to cancel an order for a new presidential plane he said was too expensive.

The company has managed to work its way back into the president’s good graces, with its share price up 129 per cent since the election in November 2016.

But since peaking in February, Boeing’s shares are down more than 10 per cent as investors consider the company’s prospects in the new trade environment Trump has created.

At least in the short term, the company has little to fear, with a healthy order portfolio of 5,864 planes — meaning it will be in constant production through 2024.

Furthermore, China, where air travel is booming, can scarcely afford to push its partly state-owned domestic carriers to cancel their orders or boycott the US manufacturer because they simply have no alternative, experts say.

Where China could strike

The Chinese manufacturer Comac, which soon hopes to market its C919 — a potential competitor to the mid-range Boeing 737 and Airbus A320 jets — is not yet ready for large-scale production. The plane had its first test flight in December.

“In the best case scenario, Comac will need another five or six years to reach a respectable production capacity,” said Michel Merluzeau, an analyst at AirInsight.

Meanwhile, Airbus, Boeing’s main competitor, also has a healthy backlog of orders and its suppliers are already struggling to keep up with the speedy new pace of production.

“In the short term, China has no choice if it doesn’t want to put the brakes on the growth of its air transport sector,” according to Merluzeau.

Boeing is also due to open a new finishing Centre for its medium-range 737 jets in Zhoushan, south of Shanghai, this year. And Beijing will certainly do nothing to jeopardise that, added Merluzeau.

Boeing hit by ransomware attack

Boeing Co. has been hit by the WannaCry computer virus, the Seattle Times reported. The ransomware attack is raising fears within the planemaker that some production equipment could be crippled, the newspaper said.

Among the production lines potentially affected are those of the 777 wide-body and Boeing’s 787 Dreamliner final assembly in North Charleston, South Carolina.

“It is metastasising rapidly out of North Charleston and I just heard 777 (automated spar assembly tools) may have gone down,” Boeing engineer Mike VanderWel wrote in a memo cited by the Seattle Times. VanderWel said he was concerned that the virus would hit equipment used to test jetliners in the factory and potentially “spread to aeroplane software.”

A similar cyberattack compromised companies such as FedEx Corp. and Nissan Motor Co. last year and crippled parts of the UK’s state-run National Health Service.

—Bloomberg