Do you think the dollar fall against the Euro will make Boeing's pricing competitive to the extent customers will be interested?
Actually I would like to know the marketing issues that makes a customer choose Airbus over Boeing. Plane price? Maintenance agreements? Parts pricing? Financing?
I know here in Seattle in the past it was Union incompetence with meeting production schedules that did Boeing in.
I don't think the fall of the dollar is healthy for the US, but in this case, it probably doesn't help the EU much. But because Boeing have so much of the plane design outsourced, it will only make paying for that more expensive for Boeing with the weaker dollar, so in the very short term it might look a bit better on paper, but it won't help in the long term because any gains will eventually catch back up to boeing in the form of greater costs.
The main reason people have chosen Airbus planes, to my knowledge, is price. The other reason could be cockpit commonality, which would facilitate a greater ability to leverage pilot training across multiple airframes. On the first count, Boeing have said, per the new CEO Stonesipher, they will not do an unprofitable airplane deal. Airbus have been rumored to do plenty of unprofitable deals with heavy discount to gain market share, hoping that due to their cockpit commonality, it will make for an easier profitable sale down the road.
On the second count, boeing really should have moved toward cockpit commonality sooner, although now they are on board with it. This is one of the good things about having a second viable aircraft manufacturer.
In terms of performance and pure operating economics, Boeing wins almost every time. The one exception to this is the class currently dominated by the A330-300, hence the 7E7.