Boeing and Adient have announced that their airplane seat joint venture Adient Aerospace is operational after securing regulatory approvals.

The companies also appointed Alan Wittman as Chief Executive Officer and named the team that will lead Adient Aerospace in addressing the aviation industry's need for more capacity and quality in airplane seating.

Industry analysts forecast the commercial aircraft seating market to grow from approximately $4.5 billion in 2017 to $6 billion by 2026.

The joint venture between Boeing, the world's largest aerospace company, and Adient, the global leader in automotive seating, is developing a portfolio of seats for new airplane and retrofit configurations.

Adient Aerospace has opened a customer service center in the Seattle, Washington area, and product development is underway in Kaiserslautern, Germany, as a continuation of work performed under an agreement the two companies signed in 2017.

Adient Aerospace is initially developing lie-flat business class seating offerings for widebody airplanes.

Adient is the global leader in automotive seating. With 85,000 employees operating 238 manufacturing/assembly plants in 34 countries worldwide, we produce and deliver automotive seating for all vehicle classes and all major OEMs.