FIA 2012: ADS announces results of its annual survey of the state of UK aerospace industry
Robin Southwell, president of ADS and CEO EADS UK, and Graham Chisnall, deputy CEO and MD Aerospace ADS delivered the results.
“2011 has been an outstanding year for the UK aerospace sector," said Chisnall. "ADS members have been at the heart of the success story that is the UK aerospace industry best seen in the hugely successful Aerospace Growth Partnership run in close partnership with the Department for Business, Innovation & Skills; we are now seeing fruition of our strategy unfolding.
"We have had the most welcome endorsement by the Prime Minister of the full and total commitment of the Government in taking forward our joint aerospace strategy to improve on growth and exports to new markets abroad. The figures contained in the 2011 ADS Aerospace Survey Results is full vindication of the investment in time and effort by ADS member companies in the AGP and not least by the tremendous efforts of the sector workforce in providing such amazing productivity growth, so essential for maintaining our competitiveness in the future.”
The results of the survey revealed that in 2011, air passenger traffic grew by 6% driving the demand for additional aircraft to service the market with single-aisle production rising to new heights. Following the trend, wide-body production is set to significantly increase in 2012 with the ramping-up of the delayed B787. Total number of aircraft produced with UK supply chain input was 1,140; a 6% increase on 2010. The gross order book for the year was 2,932 a figure that has turned out to be the best order year since 2007. Indeed, the strong order book has pushed the backlog of Airbus and Boeing demand to over 8,000 aircraft combined, representing six years of annual production.
The UK civil aerospace revenue was up by 7.6% driven by spectacular performance in exports which were up by 9.4% in nominal terms. Exports represent 75% of all UK Aerospace revenue earnings with the EU being our strongest export region.
In a sign that companies are prepared to invest in order to take advantage of potential new opportunities and markets, there was a 11% increase in R&D with a significant 45% increase in the critically enabling R&T sector.
Notable was a growth in overall employment and average wage levels, contrary to so much other sectors of the economy.
Issues that impacted the performance of the civil aerospace market in 2011 were the volatility of the price of fuel, ready availability of aircraft financing, the ability of the supply chain to meet the surge demands of increasing production rates and the manner in which new fuel efficient engines have driven new programmes which in turn has stimulated the large number of orders.
