European aircraft manufacturer Airbus, part of the aerospace and defence Airbus Group, wants to help South African company Denel Aerostructures (DAe) to expand into the commercial aircraft aerostructures sector. DAe is part of the State-owned Denel defence industrial group and is one of three South African companies that supply the Airbus Group. The other two are private sector companies Aerosud and Cobham South Africa. DAe and Aerosud are major suppliers to the Airbus Group.

“Cobham do satellite communications mountings for nearly all of our [commercial] aircraft,” reports Airbus VP International Cooperation Simon Ward. “They’re very good and its very steady work. DAe and Aerosud are more hungry. They both want to grow, but they’re very different companies. Aerosud is private, grown from scratch, very lean, very commercial, very innovative. Aerosud is driving a lot of niche manufacturing – they’ve found a nice niche play.”

DAe is heavily involved in the A400M military airlifter programme, which now falls under the Military Aircraft Division of Airbus Defence and Space, which, like Airbus, is one of the three major divisions of the Airbus Group (the third is Airbus Helicopters, formerly Eurocopter). The South African company is responsible for the A400M wing/fuselage fairings and the centre fuselage top shells (each aircraft has two of these, one each in front and behind of the centre wing box). (Aerosud is also a major supplier for the A400M, producing structures, such as the nose fuselage linings, the cargo hold linings, cockpit linings, cockpit rigid bulkhead and the aircraft galleys as well as the wingtips.)

“DAe is now very successful on the A400M, but they have no commercial [aircraft] work,” he highlights. Currently, the local company has three programmes, including the A400M. The other two are offsets-related. “What we’re trying to do with DAe is to get them into commercial [aircraft] programmes. It’s good for a company to have multiple programmes. It’s good for a supplier to have multiple OEMs [original-equipment manufacturers]. If you have problems, you don’t want delays caused by these problems to drive your supplier under.”

In Airbus’s view, the A400M work will keep DAe at steady state for years to come. “But we need to get them into commercial projects – say, work on the [Airbus] A320 and A330 [airliners],” he says. “Nothing too complicated, trying to use the asset base they have today. We want them to use their current asset base as much as possible.”

In his presentation at the Airbus Innovation Days 2014 last month, Ward praised the South African suppliers. “We started [in South Africa] with small detail parts, which were simple,” he stated. “But that was 600 part numbers – that’s a lot to manage. They [the South Africans] moved on and developed niche manufacturing capabilities. “One small company [Aerosud] builds all the track cans – they developed welding [techniques] for the track cans. I think this is unique. This is a sole source contract with that company. It always amazes us how innovative South Africans are. They are developing 3D printing of titanium [powder] using lasers.” (Track cans house the drive mechanisms for the leading edge slats on an aircraft’s wing; there are several on each wing and Aerosud produces all the track cans for nearly every type of Airbus airliner.)

Airbus’s relationship with South African companies is only a small part of its global network of partnerships and suppliers. The company, he reported, had some 8 500 suppliers around the world. “Globalisation is in our DNA. We’re constantly seeking new suppliers and new technologies.” By 2020, it is expected that Airbus will source less than 50%, by value, of its components, parts and services from inside Europe. But there will be no losers in this process, as growing demand will increase work in European plants, as well as in those outside Europe.

“Internationalisation does not destroy jobs. It creates jobs,” affirmed Ward. “Is internationalisation inevitable? Yes, it’s inevitable and the internationalisation of Airbus won’t go away.”