NWAA Summer '24 Plane Talk

The NWAA welcomes the following new members…

NWAA Chairman’s Winter statement By Prof Andy Schofield

NWAA Chief Exec’s Winter statement

CONTENTS

By Paula Gill

A very warm welcome to the latest edition of the Plane Talk Magazine. Since the last edition, the NWAA team have continued to be extremely busy welcoming new members, making arrangements for the Farnborough International Airshow, and supporting key events. As I mentioned in the last edition of the Magazine, 2024 is an important year as we celebrate the 30th year of the North West Aerospace Alliance. In March, we held this year’s Annual Conference at the truly inspirational Concorde Conference Centre in Manchester. The conference was an immense success and even eclipsed the event held in 2023, where I referred to the Pride and Passion for the Aerospace Industry in the North West. In my closing speech this year, I talked about the great people, the world class advanced engineering and manufacturing capability and the immense potential we have in the region. We had a stellar line-up of outstanding speakers who provided great insights into key industry activities and the opportunities there are for the future. The key theme of the conference was digital transformation and how industrial digital technologies are playing their part across the supply chain. A major takeaway was the importance of cross-sector integration and where to get the necessary support. I concluded the conference by reinforcing the main purpose of the NWAA, which is to deliver value to every member of the North West Aerospace Alliance by providing the opportunity to network, collaborate and promote their capabilities both in the UK and Internationally in order to increase future business opportunities. As we progress through 2024, we are continuing to focus on delivering our key strategy themes of providing value to our members, improving the engagement with our key stakeholders and partners, and

Hello and welcome to the Summer of 2024.

future supply chain, business growth, ease of diversification across markets, financial stability and achieving sustainability goals. We will support businesses to enable a better understanding of and how to benefit from new technologies and new ways to manufacture and grow your business and presence, whilst meeting the needs of your customers. Nichola and the team will make you aware of all the dates and locations of these events for your diaries in due course, with the first of these events taking place in late summer at Safran Nacelles in Burnley. In the meantime, you could look to attend the Digital Event @ Siemens Transform on 17th & 18th July, in Manchester, where NWAA members have been selected to share their Digital journey, with business leaders from Aerospace, the AGP and even some ministerial representatives. I will also be attending and speaking on behalf of all the NWAA members. Throughout the rest of this year, we will be bringing you lots of exciting features, events and programmes , to further support and profile your businesses including, Meet the buyers, Mix and Mingle events in association with other regions, Roundtables on various subjects and our fabulous Annual Ball. Our programmes will continue to include ATI SME Programme Support, SC21, DTEP MOD funding rounds, Watchtower, and more. We will keep you posted. The team and I are looking forward to meeting and supporting more of your businesses again this year and we are always happy to help you where we can, please make sure you come and speak to us at any events, including those where we are exhibiting. Also, don’t forget to let us know the events where you will be exhibiting, and we will come and support where possible. So here is wishing you a fantastic summer season full of success, new orders and sunshine, with a holiday or two there too.

ensuring we remain at the forefront of future developments and drive economic and societal impact in the North West. Membership continues to increase on a monthly basis, which is a testament to the hard work of the team. Also, planning is well underway for the Farnborough International Airshow in July, which will be the first time since 2018 that the NWAA will have a stand at the Airshow, and this provides a great opportunity for our members to showcase their capabilities and network with the best in the Aerospace industry. You will be able to see the feedback from the Airshow in the next edition of Plane Talk. As an Alliance, with your continued support, we remain committed to help drive the Aerospace and Defence Industry in the North West forward.

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02 Chairman’s statement

We are in the season of Airshows, the most exciting and busy time in our calendars and it’s no different here at NWAA. We are very excited to be exhibiting at Farnborough Airshow this year, in the UK hall 1, located at stand 1307 in partnership with composites UK, and with only one pod remaining to be sold, it promises to be a hugely successful show. We are looking forward to seeing many of you there this year, networking and discovering what’s on the horizon. If you are interested in knowing more about this year’s show, or in our remaining pod please get in touch with the NWAA team. During the last few months I have been in discussions with MOD and Regional Employer Engagement Director, for the inclusion of the ex-service men and women and their families in the opportunities for jobs and careers available across the North. At the beginning of May 24, I signed the Armed Forces Covenant on behalf of the NWAA. This is a very important area of support and we are looking forward to working with REED and our members to engage and support wherever possible, and to create and enable a ready to work workforce for our region. To support this, we are looking into developing a webpage for student apprentices, graduates, adult education and armed forces and related individuals, to promote themselves to the industry. This is exciting, but also a time- consuming and costly piece of work, so please bear with us and we will let you know when this is up and running. This is not recruitment by NWAA, just a way of showcasing the individuals that are looking for work and will only be accessible to our member companies. Leading on from this year’s successful NWAA Conference at the Concorde Centre in Manchester, our theme of support this year is focusing on Digital manufacturing. During 2024 and following the success of last year’s ESG series of four events, we aim to do the same in 2024/25 on the subject of Digital Manufacturing we will explore all levels of digital transformation and the benefits, from starting out on the journey, to developing the

03 CEO’s statement

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04 NWAA News

06 Members’ News

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22 Team

23 Meet the board

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24 NWAA Annual Ball 2024

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Prof Andy Schofield NWAA Chairman

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Let’s keep building the momentum and putting the NWAA members on the map.

YOUR CONTENT

Please forward all content for future editions of Plane Talk to our editor at Freshfield, Paul Tustin.

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Paula Gill NWAA Chief Exec

OUR STAKEHOLDERS

nwaa@freshfield.com

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01772 888400

plane talk summer 2024

www.aerospace.co.uk

@NWAerospace

plane talk summer 2024

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