Oct. 10 (Bloomberg) -- Boeing Co., betting on the 787 Dreamliner to win back leadership in commercial airliners from Airbus SAS, postponed delivery of the plane by six months because of parts shortages and assembly delays.

Dreamliner shipments will now begin in late November or December 2008, instead of May, Chicago-based Boeing said today in a statement. The first test flight, which was postponed last month, now won't take place until the end of March. Boeing fell 2.7 percent in New York Stock Exchange trading, the most since Aug. 28.

The 787 is Boeing's most successful sales campaign, with about $120 billion in orders to date. Boeing is struggling to finish work that suppliers should have completed at their plants and is several weeks from installing flight-control software from Honeywell International Inc. Boeing said the delay won't be ``material to earnings'' and didn't change its forecasts for this year and next.

``Boeing has bitten the bullet and accepted that the schedule is beyond them,'' Robert Stallard, a New York-based Banc of America Securities LLC analyst, wrote in a report to clients today. He has a ``buy'' rating on the shares. ``While this is obviously not a good-news day for Boeing, we believe that few investors had recently been placing much hope in the firm meeting first delivery in May 2008.''

Scott Carson, Boeing's commercial airplanes chief, said 15 of the Dreamliner's 50 customers will be affected by the delay. Boeing executives including Carson as recently as last month had given assurances that the Dreamliner would ship on time. The first 787 is going to All Nippon Airways Co. of Japan.

Paying Penalties

Boeing will pay penalties to customers affected by the delay, Chief Financial Officer James Bell said on a conference call today with analysts and reporters.

``Our agreement with Boeing has certain penalties in it,'' Northwest Airlines Corp. Chief Financial Officer Dave Davis said in an interview. It is too early to discuss whether penalties will be claimed, he said.

The planemaker has told suppliers to continue shipping parts as scheduled. That will increase the cost of the initial production aircraft and reduce the profit margin on those planes, Bell said.

Spirit AeroSystems Holdings Inc., which makes the Dreamliner's nose section and other fuselage parts, said in a statement the reschedule will likely result in lower shipments over the next six months. Wichita, Kansas-based Spirit is assessing how it will affect the company's earnings.

`Continued Challenges'

Boeing, which cited ``continued challenges'' completing assembly of the first Dreamliners, dropped $2.77 to $98.68 at 4:16 p.m. in composite trading. The stock has gained 11 percent this year.

``I don't think it's necessarily a big negative,'' Bob Doll, who helps oversee about $1.23 trillion as chief investment officer of global equities at BlackRock Inc., said in an interview in New York. ``If one is constructive on Boeing's long-term prospects, and one should be in our opinion, and you get a delay like this, without question that's an opportunity to add to a position if there's weakness on the stock.''

The new schedule gives Boeing more time to address any problems that may arise during flight testing, which will be the shortest commercial flight-test program in company history. Last month, Dreamliner program manager Michael Bair said the earlier first-flight delay from August left ``no room'' for unexpected events.

`Slower Resolution'

``We are not experiencing something that was unexpected,'' Chief Executive Officer James McNerney said on the call. ``We are experiencing slower resolution of what we thought we'd find.''

On Sept. 5, Carson said that while first flight might be pushed back to as late as mid-December, Boeing would still meet the May delivery date.

``While we have made some progress over the past several weeks completing work on our early production airplanes and improving parts availability across the production system, the pace of that progress has not been sufficient to support our previous plans for first delivery or first flight,'' Carson said in today's statement.

About 50 percent of Dreamliner by weight will be carbon- fiber composites instead of traditional aluminum, increasing fuel efficiency.

New Plane Technology

``This is a brand new plane technology,'' said John Plueger, chief operating officer of International Lease Finance Corp., a unit of American International Group Inc. and the biggest 787 customer. ``It's not a surprise and we've communicated to Boeing that we'd rather see it late but have it right.'' .

The 787, approved by Boeing's board in late 2003, will cost about $10 billion to develop, according to Paul Nisbet, an analyst at JSA Research in Newport, Rhode Island.

About $6 billion came from Boeing and $4 billion from suppliers sharing the risk associated with developing the new plane by designing their own parts, Nisbet estimated.

Airbus's competing A350 XWB will enter service in 2013, five years after the Dreamliner, delayed after airline customers rejected several early designs for the aircraft. Deliveries of the European planemaker's superjumbo A380 are two years late because of improperly installed wiring.

``I don't think this has any major effect on the program,'' John Leahy, chief operating officer at Airbus, said in an interview of Boeing's change of plans. ``I don't think they'll lose any orders over this.''

Airbus Deliveries

Yesterday, Airbus said it delivered 330 planes in the first nine months of the year, one more than Boeing, as the two vie for the title of the world's biggest commercial aircraft builder.

Airbus, a unit of European Aeronautic, Defence and Space Co., lags behind its U.S. rival on new orders, winning contracts for 854 aircraft this year. Boeing won 903 orders in the period, according to its Web site.

Both manufacturers have forecast 2007 deliveries of about 445 planes. Boeing beat Airbus on new orders last year for the first time in five years, largely because of the success of the Dreamliner. Both are benefiting from record-setting demand generated by Asian and Middle Eastern airlines.

Reaffirmed Forecast

Boeing reaffirmed its profit forecasts today. The company in July raised its 2007 forecast to $4.80 to $4.95 a share from $4.55 to $4.75. The company projected sales of $65 billion. Analysts predicted $5.04 in earnings for the year. The company reiterated its 2008 earnings forecast of $5.55 to $5.75 a share. Analysts expect $6.17 a share next year.

``This is a blow, but better to deal with it now and move forward,'' said Richard Aboulafia, an analyst at Fairfax, Virginia-based aerospace consultant Teal Group. ``A delay hurts, but at least there are no indications of performance shortfalls.''

Boeing will give a financial performance update when it releases third-quarter earnings results on Oct. 24.

To contact the reporter on this story: James Gunsalus in Seattle at jgunsalus@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: October 10, 2007 18:55 EDT