Turbine blade joint venture formed (Xinhua) Updated: 2006-08-26 10:45
China will manufacture turbine blades for top civil aircraft in a joint
venture with a top French company.
Snecma, the biggest subsidiary of
France-based Safran Group, a Fortune 500 company, signed an investment contract
with Guizhou-based Xinyi Machinery Factory under China Aviation Industry
Corporation (CAIC) on Friday to form a turbine blade joint venture. The
first phase of the project involves an investment of 15 million U.S. dollar
which will be used to build a blade production line for CFM56 engines, the most
widely used aero engine in the world.
"The joint venture represents a
high-level cooperation between the two companies," said Yang Rui, deputy
director of the Engine Sector of CAIC. Yang believed that the new
venture will bring advanced knowledge in technology, business and
management. "We have enjoyed good cooperation with Xinyi in the past ten
years and we see the cooperation in a long-term way," said Marc Ventre, CEO of
Snecma.
Safran's presence in China began as early as the 1930s when the
company sold engines to the Chinese army. In the 1970s, the company began to
provide CFM56 engines for Chinese civil airlines. More than 1,000 CFM56 engines
on the Chinese mainland market come from the French company.
Snecma has
established cooperative ties with eight Chinese aviation companies, employing
more than 2,000 local staff.
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