A view of the DAe plant in Kempton Park, east of Johannesburg
Photo by: Duane Daws/Creamer Media
South African aerospace companies Aerosud and Denel Aerostructures (DAe) signed a tripartite memorandum of understanding (MoU) with European major airliner company Airbus at the DAe plant at OR Tambo International Airport, in Kempton Park, on Tuesday. The MoU creates an industrial and research alliance between the three businesses.
“The fact that Denel [Aerostructures] and Aerosud will be working together should mean that they can jointly bid for bigger, more extensive and greater volume work,” Airbus VP: international cooperation Simon Ward told Engineering News Online. “DAe has bigger tools and Aerosud can do smaller parts very efficiently. There are different capabilities in DAe and Aerosud.”
In terms of the MoU, the three companies will jointly develop industrial projects that will enable Aerosud and DAe to jointly bid for work packages on Airbus airliner programmes that would be larger than the work packages each could bid for on its own. In his address at the MoU signing event, Ward asserted that: ‘[W]e sign a roadmap that will develop this industry for the next ten years.” The MoU builds on more than seven years of cooperation between Airbus and South African industry – since 2005 the European company had placed work packages and research projects in South Africa that were worth R4-billion.
At the same event, DAe CEO Ismail Dockrat affirmed that the “signing of this MoU marks a major step forward for the South African aerospace industry. It represents a strengthened industrial alliance between Denel Aerostructures, Aerosud and Airbus. At Denel, we are delighted to strengthen our relationship with Airbus. For DAe, you [Airbus] have been a critical partner.”
He noted that the South African aerospace industry was one of the few outside Europe that has the skills and capabilities to build parts for major aircraft projects, such as the Airbus A400M military transport aircraft. The MoU would allow DAe and Aerosud to jointly bid for key aerostructures work packages on large commercial aircraft projects.
“The significance of the event today – we are getting to enter into close cooperation with the other key player in South African aerostructures, DAe,” affirmed Aerosud Holdings Chairman Dr Paul Potgieter in his address. “We are highly complementary operations; there is very little competition between us.” This meant that the two South African companies, one State-owned (DAe) and the other private-sector, were in a good position to form an alliance.
“This tripartite cooperation will position Aerosud and DAe to be able to work together and access a greater share of work from global players such as Airbus,” stated Department of Public Enterprises chief director Weekend Bangani, speaking on behalf of the government. “Airbus have demonstrated their long-term commitment to South Africa and the African continent.”