Dubai Airshow: Airbus and Mubadala Development Company sign component agreements

Airbus and Mubadala Development Company today signed two agreements for the manufacture of aileron composite panels and the production of assembled aileron shipsets for the A330 / A340 aircraft series.

Production will commence in 2011 at the STRATA composites aero structures manufacturing facility, located in Al Ain, Abu Dhabi, owned by Mubadala Development Company. The two agreements represent the first work packages directly from Airbus under the Master Supply Agreement signed between EADS/Airbus and Mubadala in November 2008.

The aileron work packages include:

Composite panels - in 2011, STRATA will commence manufacture of carbon fiber panel skins of the aileron components and will be the global sole source provider for Airbus of these components.

Assembled aileron shipsets - By mid 2012 STRATA will become dual source supplier for assembled aileron shipsets, alongside the Airbus plant in Nantes, France. STRATA will produce up to five shipsets of ailerons per month.

In 2008 European Aerospace group EADS/Airbus, and Mubadala Aerospace, a division of Mubadala Development Company, signed a multi-faceted supplier agreement. The agreement sees EADS/Airbus extend its footprint in the Middle East in terms of suppliers and production capabilities and Mubadala advance its plans to establish Abu Dhabi as a global aerospace hub.

The cooperation is expected to generate in excess of US$1 billion of revenue for Mubadala Aerospace over ten years.
Homaid Al Shemmari, Associate Director of Mubadala Aerospace, said: “Our 2008 agreement with the EADS and Airbus has been fundamental to developing several components of our aerospace strategy, not least helping us to develop STRATA composites manufacturing facility.”