SR Technics is progressing the ramp-up of its recently opened engine facility in Bad Zurzach quicker than anticipated, with demand running at stronger levels than initially projected.
Opened in January 2026, the facility is located about 25 mi. northwest of Zurich, where SR Technics operates its main facilities. The facility focuses on quick-turn engine MRO for CFM56-5B/7B and the Pratt & Whitney PW4000, for which it recently received its first heavy maintenance induction.
MRO services at the facility include high-level engine inspections, repairs, modifications and field assistance services for a worldwide customer base. SR Technics started renovating the Bad Zurzach shop in January 2025, transforming an existing industrial building into a purpose-designed engine maintenance facility.
The Swiss MRO provider plans to transfer its PW4000 product line from its main Zurich Airport operation to the SR Technics Zurzach operation, which will create additional capacity in Zurich for growing CFM Leap and Pratt GTF engine work.
“It’s moving quicker than we projected,” Bo Lump, senior vice president of business development at SR Technics, told Aviation Week, following existing SR Technics customers directing engines to the facility.
Initially, Lump said PW4000 maintenance will be divided between Zurich and Bad Zurzach during the transition. Once the transfer is completed, the additional space released at Zurich will support SR Technics’ continued ramp-up on the Leap and GTF platforms.
Lump said the move also underlines SR Technics’ continued commitment to the mature PW4000 market, with demand for maintenance remaining strong as operators extend the lives of aircraft powered by those engines. “A lot of maintenance also built up during COVID, when people weren’t doing maintenance, and now that maintenance is needed,” Lump said. “There are not a lot of good alternatives to replace those aircraft.”
Describing the PW4000 aftermarket as a niche but attractive segment, Lump said the segment for the engine requires further investment to accommodate rising demand. SR Technics’ capabilities cover the PW4000-94, which most commonly powers Boeing 747 and 767 aircraft, and PW4000-100, an engine option for the Airbus A330.
Meanwhile, the company expects to produce more than 200 engines from its main engine operation in 2026. Its reactivated second test cell, which went online in 2024, is playing an important role in supporting that volume while providing additional operational resilience.
The second cell is primarily dedicated to GTF testing but has also been configured for Leap and CFM56 engines. Lump said running two cells in parallel avoids creating a single bottleneck, particularly because GTF engines generally require longer test cell occupancy. Two years ago, the company signed a 10-year agreement with Pratt & Whitney under which, over the life of the contract, it is targeting at least 1,000 GTF shop visits.
SR Technics is also on course to begin offering third-party shop capacity for the Leap-1A engine from next year. Initially, it will release a relatively small number of open-market slots to customers, with the company prioritizing its existing Safran offload commitments before the expansion into third-party work takes place. SR Technics will eventually increase its open-market capacity for the A320neo engine option once production has stabilized.
“We want to make sure that we’re supporting the OEM directly, getting on a good pace, making sure our turnaround time is down and that we have the capability set right,” Lump added.
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