Paris 2011: Washington builds on composites cluster
Boeing’s difficulties in outsourcing sections of the http://www.ainonline.com/news/single-news-page/article/boeing-787-dreamliner-makes-an-entranc

Boeing’s difficulties in outsourcing sections of the 787 Dreamliner are well documented. From that troubling experience, however, an opportunity was born in the U.S. state of Washington, once the undisputed home of Boeing commercial airliner programs.

With its emphasis on lighter-weight construction, achieved through the use of carbon fiber composites on the fuselage, wings and other structural components, the Dreamliner helped open the door to wider application of composites in other industries, said Michael Fancher, senior program manager with the National Center for Manufacturing Sciences, in Bremerton, Washington. “Driven by aerospace primarily, the sourcing of advanced composites, both the raw material and the forms that can be used to make things, has come down in cost,” Fancher said, citing the 787.