Dassault Aviation will break ground on Friday for a new heavy-maintenance, repair and overhaul facility in Mérignac, France. This will be an addition to Dassault Falcon Service’s three dedicated heavy MRO facilities in Paris Le Bourget; Little Rock, Ark.; and Wilmington, Del. "The Mérignac shop will complement these," the company said.

The new 7,200-sq-m/77,500-sq-ft Dassault Falcon Services facility is slated to open in mid-2016 and to accommodate up to six large-cabin Falcons. The new DFS service center will be adjacent to the Falcon and Rafale assembly plants and include a paint hangar and cabin refurbishing.

The service center is expected to help Dassault prepare for a wave of upcoming C-checks on the Falcon 7X fleet, which now numbers more than 250 aircraft. Early models of the 7X entered service in mid-2007 and the C-check is due every eight years or every 4,000 cycles.