Sanad to invest in engine parts facility.
MRO provider Sanad will further cement its presence in the Al Ain region after announcing plans to invest in a new engine parts repair facility.
The Abu Dhabi-based company has confirmed it will invest AED480 million ($130 million) in an engine repair center of excellence at Al Ain Aerospace Park, a move that will bring certain repair functions in-house to improve turnaround times, expand capacity and support planned growth. The company has long-term plans to expand its market footprint and aims to eventually become the world’s fifth-largest engine maintenance company.
By 2030, Sanad will complete construction of a 190,000-ft.2 facility on greenfield land to consolidate parts repair capabilities on its engine portfolio, comprised of IAE V2500, CFM International Leap-1A and 1B, Rolls-Royce Trent 700, GE Aerospace GEnx engines, and from 2028, Pratt & Whitney Geared Turbofan (GTF) engines.
The new facility is forecast to repair 65,000 parts annually once fully operational. In contrast, Sanad inspected more than 43,000 parts last year, supporting 230 engine inductions across five platforms. In 2025, Sanad confirmed that its contracted backlog of customer work grew to AED38 billion, with more than 1,000 shop visit commitments over the next three decades.
The Mubadala-backed group is currently building a GTF MRO shop, which will also operate in the Al Ain region, following the signing of a 30-year agreement with Pratt & Whitney in February 2025. Located around 100 miles east of the company’s Abu Dhabi headquarters, the shop will have the capacity to handle 350 engines annually once operational in Q3 2028 and will also operate two large test cells, with capacity for 500 tests annually. Earlier this year, Sanad told Aviation Week that it had begun investing in tooling, developing repair capabilities and upgrading the site's infrastructure.
Sanad projects engine shop visit volumes will more than double over the next decade, growing from 230 inductions in 2025 to more than 500 annually by 2035. Sanad is also planning to add to its workforce, with plans to create around 350 jobs at the Al Ain parts operation.
“Repairs are increasingly becoming the defining factor in engine MRO,” says Mansoor Janahi, Managing Director and Group CEO of Sanad. “Building these capabilities in-house is critical to how we scale, improve turnaround times, create in-country value and deliver greater value to our customers.”
Sanad first established a presence in Al Ain early last year, after signing a deal to use a facility operated by military MRO specialist Ammroc to support 50 additional inductions annually.
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