With strong ties to the Middle East, Swiss-based completions, refurbishment and maintenance provider Amac Aerospace, here at the MEBA show, is highlighting the impending completion of a head-of-state/VVIP-configured Boeing 747-8, performed for an undisclosed customer in the region. By the end of this year, the company’s Basel facility will be starting work on its third green VIP Boeing 777 completion.

The 747-8 project is “now in the final installation phase of the interior,” according to Amac Group COO Bernd Schramm, with work expected to conclude by year’s end. This is the company’s first 747 completion, but Amac has wide-body experience from Boeing 777-200 and -300 finishings, Schramm told AIN.

Though Amac (Stand A13) has a complete design shop, in this case the 747-8’s owner provided the design package and specifications for the project and requested a proposal. “We understood how to translate what the customer wanted into production drawings and engineering data,” Schramm said of the company’s winning bid.

Amac previously performed an Airbus ACJ319 completion and maintenance services for the 747 customer, which led to the current project. The company likely hopes that history repeats itself as it also nears completion of a green ACJ319 with an interior featuring “quite a bit of carbon fiber” for a customer in Asia, Schramm said. Amac spent months searching for and testing materials for the project. “You have so many different kinds of carbon suppliers, but it’s very difficult to find the quality that meets our expectations,” he said. Delivery of the ACJ319 is planned in the second quarter of 2015.

Founded in 2007, Amac has almost 700 employees and is led by group executive chairman and CEO Kadri Muhiddin. Facilities at its EuroAirport Basel-Mulhouse headquarters include two 90,000-sq-ft (8,400-sq-m) hangars, each able to hold two wide-bodies, and a 48,000-sq-ft (4,500-sq-m) hangar. A fourth hangar is about to start construction with scheduled completion in late 2015. It is slightly smaller than 90,000-sq-ft, and will be able to accommodate one widebody or two BBJ/ACJ-size jets. The hangar roofs are of wooden construction, as it is cheaper than steel. As of the first quarter of 2015, Amac will have delivered 12 bizliner completions.

An ACJ319 completion costs from about $35 million to $45 million, depending on complexity, options and layout, Schramm explained. A wide-body like a 747 with an interior about four to five times larger costs a commensurate amount more.

In addition to green completions, refurbishments and interior upgrade projects also keep the facility busy, alongside MRO work, which tends to focus on supporting the completions/refurbishment business.

Maintenance Expands

Amac also has maintenance approvals from Boeing for BBJs, the 747 and 777, and from Airbus for ACJs, and 330/340-series airliners, as well as approval as a continuous airworthiness maintenance organization (CAMO). For painting Amac uses Ruag at Oberpfaffenhofen in Germany and QAPS in Holland.

During a visit to its facilities in mid-November, it was clear that Amac is far busier now that two years ago, when AIN attended the opening of the second large hangar (third overall). Eric Hoegen, sales and key account manager for Amac’s completions activities, claimed, “Amac is one of the few facilities to deliver on time and on budget,” which he says is why customers come back.

According to Hoegen, Amac also performs completions and refurbishment projects on “smaller aircraft such as Global Expresses and Gulfstreams [usually carried out in the smaller, original hangar],” and he added, “We have just delivered a fully refurbished Global. It’s the first Global we did using our own internal design capability.” But Amac is “focused on the VVIP market,” he noted.

Waleed Muhiddin, vice president strategic operations and business development, indicated that another 747-8 completion could be close to being under contract, and also said the company would definitely not look at providing modular completions solutions similar to those introduced by Airbus and the likes of SR Technics in the past couple of years. In his view, this approach is not right for the VVIP market, and suggested that such concepts were ill-conceived, given the demands likely from customers during projects, which could cause them to make costly alterations anyway.

Pilatus Dealership

Through Amac Aerospace Turkey A.S., the company has a hangar at Istanbul Ataturk Airport for its PC-12 and Dassault Falcon maintenance work; the Turkish operation is the exclusive distributor for Pilatus Aircraft in the region, and is an authorized service center for Falcon Jets.

In October Amac announced it will take delivery of two PC-24 twin-engine jets in 2019 for use as demonstration aircraft (one it ordered as part of the orders announced at the EBACE show in May, while the second has been added since).

In addition to its Basel facilities, the company has an office in Zurich for aircraft management and charter service. The company has some 16 aircraft under management, from a PC-12 to MD-80 and ACJ A320 executive airliners. The charter is brokered, which Schramm describes as “a convenience for customers;” managed aircraft are not available for charter. The company also has a regional sales office for Pilatus aircraft in Beirut, currently idle due to the country’s unstable political situation.

Amac operates on two principles, Schramm said. First, having complete in-house capability for all interior design, fabrication, testing and certification work, which gives the company complete control over its projects. The second is that, “we have flat hierarchies in our company. The doors of management are open to everyone. We want to run it like a family business because, in the end, it’s the people on the hangar floor [that are responsible for the company’s success].”