News

Jet Aviation to Acquire Midcoast

Jet Aviation announced it has reached an agreement to acquire Midcoast Aviation. The transaction is expected to close by the end of March 2006. "When Jet Aviation was acquired by Permira Funds, they made a statement that they wanted to transition to a global leader in the aviation market," said Heinz Kohli, CEO of Jet Aviation Group at a press conference on January 31, 2006. "The acquisition of Midcoast Aviation is a significant step in this direction."

Kohli said that Jet Aviation has an ambitious growth strategy in the U. S. and that the company may be making further announcements in the near future. Additional acquisitions were not limited to the U. S., Kohli added and said that entities in South America, Russia, India, and China were also being considered for acquisition.

"Midcoast is one of the finest maintenance and completion facilities in the U. S. It has tremendous name recognition and will retain its name," said Kohli. The company will be referred to as Midcoast Aviation, a Jet Aviation Company, and will continue to be headed up by president Kurt Sutterer. Sutterer will report to Theo Staub, president and COO of Jet Aviation North America.

Midcoast will begin construction on a new 120,000 square foot hangar immediately after the close of the transaction and plans to hire 100 additional employees this year. "We are excited and proud to be joining the Jet Aviation family and look forward to making a significant contribution to Jet Aviation as we move toward a vision of growth," Sutterer said. "We are grateful to Sabreliner Corporation [previous owners of Midcoast] for allowing us to develop into a world class business," he added. -- By Joy Finnegan

Fallout on MROs from carbon fiber shortage

Annual carbon fiber supply worldwide is approximately 66.138 million lbs/year, and is sold out through 2007 in some markets. This supply shortage is creating an issue for repair facilities. "The availability of all composite materials continues to be tight, and the aircraft repair segment is no exception," states Tom Lemire, vice president of Toho Tenax America Inc. However, independent composites consultant, D. J. DeLong, reports that every international carbon fiber supplier has expansion underway, with 20% new capacity expected by this summer.

Still, with Boeing and Airbus expected to use an estimated 371,523 lbs in combined weight of composites on the B787, A380 and A350 aircraft, and other military and civil aircraft programs designating more onboard composites, the new capacity won't offset the new demand in the short term. This could leave MRO facilities, airline depots, and small quantity composite suppliers scrambling. "In the near term, since repair materials come from prepreggers, users should look to them for supplies," DeLong suggests. "If a material shortage is delaying repairs, perhaps an appeal to the primes for a direct supply could be made in special situations." Airtech International's Chad Fester reports that "relationships with our weaver and long-term customers have allowed us an uninterrupted material supply, but for the repair sector of the market, we've had to say no to some new material orders." For the past nine months, the Helicopter Division of Helicomb has found locating carbon fiber prepregs for sale something of a stealth search mission. Annette Lunnon, manager of the division, reports that larger MRO companies are calling Helicomb for help with the same problem.

Both Lemire and DeLong advise careful preplanning and multiyear contracts with suppliers to ensure a steady source of materials. There's a catch-22 in this scenario to some extent: Lunnon says smaller repair companies like Helicomb have significant variance in demand every year, and often little advance for sizeable projects. This conundrum could continue for several years. DeLong believes things will improve as the commercial primes gain a better handle on expanded usage rates. -- By Vicki P. McConnell

Delta to Lay Off Additional 1,000 Mechanics

Delta Airlines recently announced it will lay off between 800 and 1,000 maintenance workers, mostly mechanics, and outsource more maintenance. The layoffs will take place by April 1, 2006 and will further reduce the TechOps division of the company from its current 7500 employees.

Delta will also close a hangar facility at their Atlanta headquarters, referred to as the Delta north hangar, and eight smaller maintenance bases. Those eight bases include Chicago, Illinois; Newark, New Jersey; West Palm Beach, Florida; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Phoenix, Arizona; Portland, Oregon; San Diego, California; and Dallas, Texas according to a company spokesperson.

Currently Delta is outsourcing heavy maintenance checks to Avborne in Miami, Florida, and to Air Canada Technical Services in Vancouver, British Columbia.

The company will also outsource the conversion of a number 767's that Delta is re-allocating from domestic to international routes. Delta had not awarded a contract for that work as of early February but said they intended to make an announcement later in February or March. -- By Joy Finnegan

Timken to Produce Parts Under License From Rolls-Royce

Rolls-Royce Corp-oration and The Timken Company announced in De-cember an alliance to increase Timken's capabilities for Model 250 helicopter turboshaft engine parts and component repair. Timken will provide an expanded assortment of parts and services under license from Rolls-Royce for new engine production and for the aftermarket.

Roll-Royce has used Timken bearings for 30 years but this agreement expands the supply range into other engine parts. "We are looking forward to a long-term relationship with Rolls-Royce," said J. Ron Menning, Timken's vice-president of aerospace, consumer and super precision. "Over the last few years we have been expanding our capabilities to produce power transmission parts for small turboshaft engines and look forward to applying these resources to one of the most successful turbine engines ever."