Midlands Aerospace Alliance convenes partners and Midlands businesses at a successful Farnborough Airshow

Farnborough Airshow 2024 was a big show for Midlands aerospace. Professionals from across the globe gathered on the MAA stand to explore the latest products, services, capabilities and innovations offered by the region’s companies.

The MAA team fostered many business and partnership opportunities throughout the week. 26 companies exhibited their expertise on the Midlands stand. Many exhibitors had numerous approaches from potential new customers during the show, which demonstrated the level of interest in what the Midlands has to offer as bigger companies actively seek to expand their supplier bases.

The show was busy right from the moment the doors opened on the Monday. Across the week, more than 150 people from exhibiting companies, as well as the MAA team, worked hard to showcase the best of the Midlands to every visitor. To support this, the MAA launched the new 2024 members directory on the first day of the show with details of over 250 great companies and their capabilities.

High-profile visitors to the MAA stand

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer visited the UK Pavilion following his speech at the opening of the show and spoke with MAA member, AVPE Systems, part of Broadway Group, one of MAA’s exhibitors. The MAA also had a number of key government visitors, thanks to the support of the Department of Business and Trade and the ADS public affairs team.

The Midlands Aerospace Alliance also had several high-profile industry visits, including Tendai Mutambirwa from the Civil Aviation Authority and Katherine Bennett CBE, Chief Executive of the High Value Manufacturing Catapult.

Jason Aldridge of Arrowsmith Engineering with the SC21 Silver Award

Giving a global platform to new technologies from the Midlands

The ‘Innovation in the Midlands’ conference, delivered in partnership with the University of Nottingham’s Institute for Aerospace Technology, highlighted new technologies and capabilities emerging in lower supply chain tiers as important building blocks for future aerospace and space industry requirements.

The conference gave a number of small Midlands manufacturers opportunities to discuss the innovative projects they’ve been delivering, including Burcas, G&O Springs, P.A.K Engineering, PGM Reball, SHD Composites and ZEEKO.

The MAA’s innovation programmes include

• Recognising the achievements of companies participating in the £1m Pivot into Space R&D programme.
• The completion of the ASSIST funding matchmaking programme and launch of a report which shared the findings.
• Technology Manager, Clive Lewis chaired the Advanced Air Mobility panel at the Global Urban & Advanced Air Summit at Farnborough Airshow which included discussions about the Drone Ready Cities project we are partnering on with Coventry City Council
• The Decarbonising the Midlands Aerospace Cluster (DMAC) programme has been gaining pace, with a number of companies involved exhibiting at the show.

The Airshow was a great opportunity for the MAA Technology Manager team involved in all of our innovation projects to engage with businesses and have valuable discussions.

Look out for an article with the latest from these projects next week.

A new launchpad into aerospace and space

A new MAA initiative launched just before the airshow – the Supply Chain Transition Programme – designed to support organisations interested in getting into aerospace and space with entering the sectors, and is run in partnership with Business Growth West Midlands.

The first cohort of participating companies had the opportunity to join discovery tours to help them understand business opportunities in the sectors, led by our Technology Managers. The tours took companies to targeted locations, giving helpful insights into the aerospace and space industries, and providing opportunities to meet key industry players relevant to their business growth objectives.

Bringing the regions together

Alongside the MAA in the UK Pavilion at Farnborough was Aerospace Wales Forum, Farnborough Aerospace Consortium, North West Aerospace Alliance, and the West of England Aerospace Forum – alongside ADS and Invest Northern Ireland.

Together, the regional alliances met with major defence company MBDA during the show to discuss the potential for holding supply chain opportunity events later in the year. UK regions that – like the MAA – are members of the European Aerospace Cluster Partnership also gathered with peer organisations from across the world for a Global Aerospace Cluster Partnership networking meeting at the Irish Embassy in London.