Airliner World Magazine MRO Europe 2024 Special Issue

As the aviation industry gathers in Barcelona for MRO Europe 2024 from October 22-24, Airliner World – in this special supplement compiled and produced by Ian Harbison – examines some interesting market developments.

Compared to the rest of the world, AFI KLM Engineering & Maintenance sees the European MRO market as having a large number of airlines and strong seasonality of demand, where airlines need all the capacity they can get in the busy summer period. That can produce maintenance challenges, which it is trying to beat with new facilities and IT developments. It is also getting involved in eVTOL and hydrogen power.

AJW and Satair Europe are both heavily involved in used serviceable material, which plays a vital support role as manufacturers try to ramp up production and train new personnel post-pandemic. AJW is investing in IT, new aircraft types and eVTOL. Satair is also investing in IT and is finding there is closer co-operation between OEMs, the company and airlines.

For Swiss Aviation Software, it is finding a distinct trend that future applications of its AMOS MRO software will be fully web-based, paperless and mobile.

Aviation is constantly developing new technology to reduce fuel consumption and CO2 emissions. AeroSHARK, a collaboration between Lufthansa Technik and BASF, simulates the riblets in shark skin to smooth airflow and reduce drag. It is now beginning to find customers outside Lufthansa Group airlines.

Finally, what will be the long-term requirements for MRO in Europe? A good source of data is market forecasts, and we look at what Airbus, Boeing and Embraer have seen in their respective crystal balls.