Fast 5: FL Technics Indonesia Expands MRO Capacity

FL Technics Indonesia recently opened a new aircraft painting facility in Bali as it eyes further expansion in the country. Chairman Martynas Grigas spoke with Aviation Week about the company’s investments and how it expects Indonesia’s aftermarket demand to grow.

What kind of aircraft and engine MRO capabilities do you possess in Indonesia?

2026 marks our tenth year in Indonesia, which is a big milestone for us, given how dynamic and demanding this market is. Over the last decade, we’ve built a dual-station network across the country’s two key aviation hubs: Soekarno-Hatta (CGK) in Jakarta and Ngurah Rai (DPS) in Bali. Between the two, we have over 44,500 m² (about 479,000 ft.²) of hangar and office space, backed by a team of more than 700 people.

Our core focus is base and line maintenance for narrowbody aircraft—specifically the Airbus A320 family (both Ceo and Neo) and Boeing 737s (Classic, NG and MAX). We also handle engines like the [Pratt & Whitney] PW1100G, [CFM International] CFM56 series and Leap family, and [IAE] V2500. Narrowbodies are really the backbone of Southeast Asian aviation, especially in an archipelagic country like Indonesia, where 17,000 islands rely on air travel as critical infrastructure.

On top of standard maintenance, we offer aircraft logistics, operate a bonded logistics center to speed up imported parts, run a dedicated aircraft painting booth in Bali and handle technical training. We also do a lot of work with airlines and leasing companies on aircraft redeliveries, which is a huge area of demand in this region right now.

How is the business performing? What kind of growth trends are you noticing?

Business has been strong, and the overall trends in the region are working in our favor. Southeast Asia is playing an increasingly important role in the global MRO market. High passenger demand, fleet growth and ongoing OEM delivery delays are driving a massive surge in maintenance work.

Because new aircraft are delayed, airlines are keeping their existing fleets flying much longer than originally planned. Instead of standard replacement cycles, we’re seeing carriers make major investments in heavy maintenance, structural work and return-to-service projects. Keeping current planes in the air has become just as crucial as bringing in new ones.

A great example of this is a Boeing 737-500 we recently reactivated for domestic routes. It took a lot of careful restoration, but it proved that older, well-maintained aircraft are still commercially valuable. For an MRO with our setup, that shift creates a really solid, long-term opportunity.

Your parent company is an ACMI provider. How differently do you operate MRO operations from other MRO providers?

Being part of Avia Solutions Group gives us a distinct mindset. It’s less about doing MRO differently on a technical level and more about how we view the business as a whole. Because our group operates in the ACMI space, we deeply understand the real-world operational pressure points—like tight schedules, aircraft availability and redelivery conditions—from an airline’s perspective, not just a manual’s.

Our geographic footprint in Jakarta and Bali is also a major advantage. Jakarta is one of the busiest transit hubs in Southeast Asia, while Bali gives us exposure to constant, high-frequency tourist traffic.

Crucially, both of our facilities hold over 20 civil aviation approvals. That means operators get the exact same high standard of capability whether they land in CGK or DPS, which isn’t easy to find in this market.

What kind of opportunities do you see in Indonesia? Any particular airports with potential? Conversely, what are the challenges in the country?

Indonesia’s opportunity for the MRO sector is enormous, and largely still unrealized. The country operates the largest domestic aviation market in Southeast Asia, serving major destinations by narrowbody aircraft to connect across the archipelago. As fleet sizes grow and aircraft utilization rates remain high, the demand for localized, capable MRO support will only intensify. Our current strategic focus remains on strengthening and expanding our existing network in Jakarta and Bali, where we see significant headroom for growth before looking further afield.

The challenges, however, are real and should not be understated. Logistics is perhaps the most structurally persistent issue. Most aircraft components and materials are sourced internationally, and delivery lead times, even with improvements through the bonded logistics center framework, remain a variable that requires constant management. Our investment [logistics center] capability directly addresses this, but it is an area that demands ongoing attention across the industry.

The availability of licensed aircraft maintenance engineers is a second constraint that the Indonesian MRO sector must address. Building our team of more than 700 aviation professionals over 10 years has required sustained and deliberate investment in technical training and talent development. As the market continues to grow, the pipeline of qualified engineers needed to expand at pace is not something that happens without long-term commitment from operators and regulators alike.

What future plans and capabilities are you pursuing? Which other airlines are you working to secure?

Our most immediate infrastructure priority is the expansion of our Jakarta facility at Soekarno-Hatta. Having successfully grown our Bali presence and progressively extended its capability, we are now focused on increasing capacity at CGK to meet the growing volume of demand we are seeing from both existing and prospective customers. Aircraft maintenance activity across the region is increasing materially, and our infrastructure needs to keep pace.

On the capability side, the aircraft painting booth we launched at our Bali facility in late June is a strong indicator of our strategic direction. By the end of August, we [completed] 10 aircraft painting projects through the facility, a clear validation of the market need we identified. Beyond painting, we expect to see continued growth in heavy maintenance check demand as the regional fleet ages and return-to-service activity intensifies, and we are positioning our capacity expansion accordingly.

In terms of airline relationships, we work with carriers across a wide range of countries, and our civil aviation authority approval portfolio reflects that. Expanding that approval list is a deliberate and ongoing strategy as every new approval is, in effect, a new market unlocked, enabling us to serve the registered aircraft of operators from that country. While we cannot name specific airlines currently in discussion, our pipeline spans both cargo and passenger segments and includes operators from markets across Southeast Asia where we see the strongest near-term growth potential.