Extension of the regional repair station network

Triumph Aviation Services – Asia Ltd (TASA) has partnered up with Airbus to provide regional and complex repair services – powered by Satair Group – on Airbus structural flight control surfaces to airlines and MROs in the Asia-Pacific region for the A320 single-aisle family and A330/A340 long-range aircraft.

TASA – part of Triumph Group Inc. of the USA - will carry out this work from its Bangkok Free Trade Zone facility. The area covered includes Asia and Oceania where over 2,000 relevant aircraft are in service, with the fleet projected to grow to more than 3,700 aircraft by 2020.

Under the agreement TASA’s flexibility, technical expertise and know-how is partnered with Airbus quality standards and services to provide Asia-Pacific customers with a quicker, more responsive, and top quality regional repair service, removing the need for parts to be shipped to Europe for repair, as was previously the case.

Christian Markau, Service Manager Repair Services at Satair Group in Hamburg explained that the template for the TASA agreement was a similar partnership achieved with Nordam in the USA covering single-aisle elevator, Sharklet and Wide-Body elevator repairs.

“Nordam carries out these repairs on a partnership basis with Airbus for the Americas. There was customer demand for a regional repair centre to deliver greater proximity and provide a more convenient service than having to ship parts to Europe. Nordam is an Airbus-approved partner for repairs in and outside the Structural Repair Manual (SRM) limits where assembly jigs provided by Airbus are necessary to restore the customer assets and consequently avoid scrapping the components.

“While customer satisfaction, proximity and global reach were important drivers, in the long-term we will also benefit from improved access to the repair market through the partnership,” he said.

With the Nordam programme working well, the team decided to offer the same service to the Asia-Pacific market, but on a larger scale, due to the broader variation of aircraft types flying in this emerging region. Bigger volumes are foreseen in future years.

Gonzalo Salazar, Project Leader and Global Repair and Network Manager stated: “We held a competitive tender with up to nine suppliers/MROs in the region and TASA won the tender on a range of criteria including price, quality of offer, capability and location.”

TASA is now an Airbus-approved partner for repairs, including heavy damage repairs beyond SRM limits. Gonzalo added: “Single-aisle elevator and Sharklet repairs are now available and work is well underway to install and calibrate A330/A340 elevator and rudder jigs used for out of manual repairs.”

Christian added: “We are convinced that our initiative will be very well received in the market and everyone will be a winner. Customers get a better service, TASA adds to its capabilities and Airbus and hence, Satair Group gets increased market share in the repair sector”.
The unique parts lease and exchange services from Airbus are still available to customers, but with the added convenience that all exchange parts, which are subject to contractual agreement, can be sent back to TASA rather than shipped back to Europe.

TASA’s active sales team is in close contact with regional customers so feedback will allow demand-driven potential new repair product lines to be developed.

Rene Frandsen, Managing Director and Head of Sales & Support Asia-Pacific concluded: “This project is very much for the long-term and with a good performance achieved by TASA expect new incoming opportunities to serve our customers in the Asia-Pacific region.”

Source: Article first published in SimplyFly #5