BARCELONA--Panasonic Technical Services is planning further growth of its line maintenance footprint over the next year following the confirmed expansion of its aircraft ground handling services offering.
The company, traditionally specializing in in-flight entertainment (IFE) system repairs, has announced it will start offering the broader line maintenance services in the U.S. at Los Angeles International Airport and Seattle Tacoma Airport.
Adding two more U.S. locations takes Panasonic Technical Services’ (PTS) total ground handling services sites to eight airports in Australia at Adelaide, Cairns, Darwin and Sydney, New Zealand in Christchurch and Honolulu in Hawaii. The network covers nine airline customers in total.
By ramping up its ground handling services, Panasonic Technical Services now offers four-line maintenance offerings as it seeks to broaden its services in that field. Its current line maintenance services include transit checks, conducted on aircraft during short layovers and including aircraft exteriors inspections and checking fluid levels.
It also carries out ETOPS checks, applicable to twin-engine aircraft operating on routes that are more than 60 min. Daily checks, which are routine inspections carried out every 24 hr., include aircraft exterior inspections, checking functionality of all emergency gear and testing avionics systems. PTS also carries out weekly checks, which involves testing of critical aircraft systems, checking cabin safety equipment, seating and other passenger areas, among other services.
PTS’ line maintenance services cover 12 aircraft types including Airbus A320neo, A321, A330, A350 and A380 aircraft, Boeing 737 MAX, 747-400, 747-8, 777-200, 777-300ER and 787-9, and McDonnell Douglas MD-11 aircraft.
“Our services business has gone from just IFE maintenance to be able to do transit turns and be able to turn an aircraft we're doing daily and weekly checks, as well as managing the ETOP systems,” says Tom Eskola, vice president of Panasonic Technical Services at Panasonic Avionics.
Eskola says the expansion into ground handling services started just before COVID-19 and the full line maintenance capability is the fastest growing part of the avionics giant’s services business.
In total, PTS operates 46 line maintenance stations worldwide focusing on its IFE products. Eskola says having this infrastructure in place has enabled its expansion into ground handling services. “At each of those line stations, we have parts, we have people, we have licensed mechanics and authorizations to work on aircraft. To be able to expand from that into ground handling is not too difficult and over the past seven years, we’ve been able to ramp up that capability and service those nine airline customers. Now we have a compelling offer to airlines to be able to expand even more.
PTS also has a repair network comprised of eight repair centers worldwide. Its Europe location is a component repair shop in Dundalk, Ireland, where it has added extra capacity and labor in recent years. It is ramping up further for the Sony Astrova IFE system, with the first Astrova-equipped aircraft scheduled for delivery in November with an unnamed European customer.
“Dundalk will soon be taking on some of the new test equipment that's required for the Astrova deliveries that are happening," says Eskola. "The Dundalk repair center will be repairing the line replaceable units from that location, so we're just expanding the capabilities at that repair center.”
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