AMAC Aerospace AG commits to building fourth hangar at Basel, Switzerland HQ

Sunday 7th December 2014

AMAC Aerospace AG, a leading provider of VIP and corporate aviation maintenance and completion services confirmed today at the Middle East Business Aviation Show MEBA in Dubai that it has recently broken ground on a fourth new hangar at its Basel Mulhouse Freiburg, Switzerland facilities.  Representing a significant investment, the new hangar, which on completion will be similar in size to the two existing wide-bodied aircraft facilities and provide AMAC with a total of 38,100 square meters of hangar floor space, will meet the demands for widebody maintenance of the company's client base.

Bernd Schramm, Group Chief Operating Officer for AMAC, anticipates that when the fourth hangar is completed in the fourth quarter of 2015 it will be utilised for predominantly wide-bodied maintenance work. "We expect to see the ratio of Refurbishment/Completion and MRO projects shift from a 70:30 split, to 60:40, as the new building will increase our capacity for maintenance. We see a lot of opportunity in the narrow and wide-body maintenance sector and as this has rapidly become an area of expertise for AMAC we will be focusing more on this segment."

AMAC Aerospace AG has to date delivered 10 major VVIP completion, refurbishment and modification projects.  These include an Airbus A320; four Airbus ACJ319s, a Boeing 777-200LR and a Boeing 777-300ER, a Boeing BBJ2, an Airbus A340 and a Global Express. Currently in the hangar for VVIP completions are a Boeing 747-8i scheduled for delivery to a Middle East customer in the first quarter of 2015 and an Airbus ACJ319 for its first Asian customer, to be delivered in the second quarter of the New Year. Another green B777-200 VVIP completion project for a Head of State client is scheduled to arrive on 12 December 2014.

AMAC Aerospace is also bolstering its in-house design offering.  Its expertise in this field will be showcased during this week's MEBA as a Global Express featuring AMAC's interior refurbishment project wholly designed by its professional in-house design team will be displayed on the static. The interior involved a high degree of precision engineering, attention to detail and quality workmanship to create a contemporary feel using warm greys and a stylised red accent stripe, whilst the exterior livery was painted with a customized scheme which reflected the interior's modern red accent stripe.

Demonstrating the company's successful growth it is recruiting an average of two engineers and 5-6 production specialists per month, according to Schramm, noting the workforce has grown from 552 in 2012 to a team of 672 to date this year.

"We have been lucky in being able to attract skilled specialist workers from the northern part of Switzerland, the southern part of Germany and the French Alsace region, especially with interiors and upholstery specialists who previously worked in the automobile industry - with the likes of Peugeot and Citroën."

Complementing the mainstay activity in Europe, AMAC Aerospace Turkey's three-storey sales and service centre at Ataturk Airport, Istanbul is focused on developing its maintenance offering having received Authorized Dassault Service Center status to work on Dassault Falcon 900/900EX EASy and Falcon 2000/2000EX EASy models. "We will be adding the Falcon 7X type in 2015 Q1 and our aim is to establish an MRO serving all Falcon types including C checks.

We will also continue to look at adding other aircraft types to our capability list. Our FAA FAR-145 approval process is continuing and we plan to get it in 2015 Q1 also," said Atilla Güney, COO of AMAC Aerospace Turkey. "AMAC is currently providing maintenance services to all Turkish registered F900s and F2000s and Middle Eastern customers are making the most of the Turkish location owing to the time saving and cost effective solutions afforded by not flying aircraft to Western Europe for maintenance," he added.

AMAC Aerospace will be present at this year's MEBA Chalet Number A13. The Global Express, which is being sold by AMAC Aerospace, will be displayed on the static.

About AMAC Aerospace

Founded in 2007 Executive Chairman & Group CEO Kadri Muhiddin leads AMAC Aerospace.  The company boasts a 670-plus workforce and an order book of US$1 billion plus.  Its business is split 60:40 between VIP completions and maintenance work and its extensive hangarage facilities in Basel, Switzerland have the capability to accommodate two wide-body and five single-aisle large jets, plus lighter business jet types.

The AMAC Aerospace Turkey facility features 1,500 sqm of hangarage, 1,200 square meters of shop floor space and 300 square meters of office space. Its wide ranging core aviation services include line and base maintenance; defect rectification & AOG Support; accomplishment of airworthiness reviews and certificates; AD/SB assessment; development of maintenance and reliability programmes; planning of scheduled maintenance activities; management of modification and repairs; out-sourced engineering tasks and services and pre-buy inspections.

www.amacaerospace.com