GBP15 million expansion planned

Gardner Aerospace wants to double production of commercial aircraft components to 90,000 pieces a month by 2023, in response to strong demand from the global aviation industry, said Dominic Cartwright, Vice President for Business Development for the EMEA markets.

Having started in 1998, the British group runs two production facilities out of Bengaluru which are part of the 17 factories around the world that produce aero-structures and detailed components for clients including market leader Airbus.

It has invested GBP15 million in the last three years on surface and machining capabilities in India and plans to invest another GBP15 million on its niche production facilities.

“We make about 45,000 components a month in India which then go back into higher level assemblies in the UK and/or France for Airbus,” Cartwright said.

Gardner is growing in Bengaluru, having opened our second factory in September last year.

“This expansion has doubled our size, increasing output by 40-50%,” said Cartwright, who is focused on doubling the skilled manpower size to 300 people in phases.

“We are looking at an additional manufacturing facility,” he said, adding that high-tech machining and tooling systems would be installed as an ongoing process of upgrading production from India.

The idea is to grow the Indian business as a supplier to Gardner Aerospace and as a supporter of external supply chain in India.

Gardner is already working with Indian OEMs with an annual business growth of 20%.

Though current production is mostly shipped to assemblies in the UK and France, future output will be split into internal and external supplies, covering both Gardner-supported assemblies and the Indian civil aviation industry.

Cartwright underlined the Gardner expansion mode, pointing out that the joint venture manufacturing concern was made a wholly-owned subsidiary in 2012, having first started out as a partnership in 1998.

Overall, the GBP220 million business is moving towards GBP450 million turnover in 2023. “This target is not ambitious, given that India is going to be a huge market, due to the expected growth in airline passengers.” fiinews.com