19th March, 2024 – An important announcement regarding its competitive strategy in the near future has been released by the oil giant Shell (SHEL). The company is about to shift its focus from the traditional retail businesses to EV charging sites, with the London based company that opted for expanding the number of charging stations mainly in Europe and China. Shell will divest about 500 old sites (like the gasoline ones) per year in 2024 and 2025, with these closures contributing in reducing retail’s footprint drastically (about 2.1%). With respect to these important changes, Shell decided to give more importance to public charging rather than in-home charging, with the latter being an alternative that is popular in the US. Shell plans to increase the total number of its charger points from 54000 up to 200000 during the next 6 years.
Major Boeing’s (BA) (0.15 units purchased @251.28) suppliers for the defense, space and security divisions, despite increasing their number of on time deliveries during 2023 (from 75% in 2022 up to 80% in 2023 for defense), were not able to provide an overall satisfactory performance. The main factors that determined this poor result are the late shipments caused by increasing costs, low availability of key components and lack of skilled individuals to hire after the end of the COVID 19 pandemic. These factors generate relevant difficulties for plane makers, defense suppliers and aerospace companies. Boeing is now forced to deal with this additional criticality, while it is still facing the consequences of a cabin panel blowout of a Boeing 737 MAX 9 in January and the increasing orders for its main defense products due to the possible escalation between China and the Philippines, together the conflicts in Eastern Europe and Middle East.
Author: Piero Foberti