Aero Sekur (Hall 1 Stand F294), an Italy-based, multi-national company that supplies and maintains safety equipment for the aerospace and defense industries, is expanding in both product offerings and locations.
“With AgustaWestland,” Aero Sekur chairman Mark Butler told AIN, “we’re developing emergency floatation and external life-raft systems for the AW189 helicopter. We’re creating a system that will have as much commonality as possible so that it can be used across the whole line of existing models, as well as ones developed for the future.”
The concept is to offer base systems that will need only minor adjustments to be adapted to different models. “This will obviously reduce the parts count for manufacturing, make maintenance easier and reduce the cost of overhaul and repair,” he said. Furthermore, common systems have the promise of speeding up the development cycle, because fewer items would need to go through qualification by civil aviation authorities.
Helping to support this development and other aspects of the company is Marco Borghesi, newly appointed chief operating officer. Based the company’s main manufacturing facility south of Rome, Borghesi brings experience from railway engineering companies, where he also served as COO. He joined Aero Sekur about a year ago and took over his new position in May, Butler said.
Borghesi’s responsibilities will include overseeing the operations of the company’s four main sectors: airborne systems; defense products; technology solutions; and maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) services. He will also work with Butler and Silvio Rossignoli, Aero Sekur president, on future development and growth of the company.
Recent expansion includes the opening of Aero Sekur do Brasil in SĂŁo Paulo earlier this year and HRD Aero Sekur in Italy becoming operational this month.
Plans for Aero Sekur do Brasil, although now primarily a marketing office, include local engineering and eventually manufacturing, possibly as early as this time next year, Butler said. A separate company, Revisa Servicos Aeronauticas, also in SĂŁo Paulo, is an Aero Sekur authorized repair station.
Back in Italy, HRD Aero Systems, a nearly 30-year-old MRO company in Valencia, California, partnered with Aero Sekur to create HRD Aero Sekur, which is located in new premises not far from Aero Sekur’s main manufacturing base in Apilla. Employees at the new company were undergoing training in May to bring the new facility on line this month, Butler said. “HRD Aero Sekur, which builds on Aero Sekur’s MRO capability, adds the repair of third-party commercial aircraft escape slides and slide rafts, life rafts, fire extinguishers and onboard oxygen systems.”
The Aero Sekur Group includes Aero Sekur SpA in Aprilla, Italy; Aero Sekur Ltd., Farnborough, England; Aero Sekur Inc., Parsippany, N.J.; Aero Sekur Srl, India; Sekur Sistemi Srl, India; Aero Sekur do Brasil, SĂŁo Paulo; HRD Aero Sekur, Aprilla, Italy; and Sensichips SpA, Italy.
