The aircraft MRO business in the Americas has specific features that distinguish it from the rest of the world. Mario Pierobon speaks with industry experts to find out the current market conditions for the region, the main areas of interest, and what retrofitting solutions are being pursued.

Market conditions

From a market perspective, the North American MRO industry is diverse with multiple customer types such as airlines, OEMs, MROs, brokers and leasing companies to name a few, affirms Nic Mehas, divisional vice president for North America of AMETEK MRO. “The operators have consolidated over the years creating several major airlines which vary greatly in their breadth and depth of MRO activities,” he says. “Some airlines have extensive in-house MRO capability from turnkey ‘heavy checks’ to engine and component MRO, others are very dependent on outsourcing MRO activities.”

With few exceptions, the fleet mix is diverse and ageing, according to Mehas. “Companies like AMETEK MRO invest heavily in value-added engineering and facilities to offer parts manufacturer approval/designated engineering representative (PMA/DER) solutions that are embraced in the Americas from a cost reduction perspective and, perhaps more importantly, reduced turnaround/lead time,” he affirms. “The MRO market post-pandemic is still facing labour and supply chain disruptions which are improving, but currently need PMA/DER solutions to counter this on-going situation.”

According to Allen McReynolds, chief operating officer of West Star Aviation, the Americas is still experiencing growth post-Covid. “While the market has certainly settled, we continue to see a shuffle of customers as they move up to larger providers with deeper expertise,” he says. “We have seen this in multiple segments, and it certainly has occurred within our business. Additionally, our growth has been multi-dimensional: market driven growth, organic growth through capacity expansion and growth through acquisition. Given the concentration of business aviation in the US, those dynamics on this scale are unique to this market.”

In the airline domain, like in Europe, partnerships with strategic OEMs will become increasingly necessary as the North American fleet mix rotates with newer aircraft, observes Mehas. “At the end of the day, MRO is a service business built on relationships that drive the industry to deliver flexible product and service offerings, and at AMETEK MRO we constantly strive for optimum customer support,” he says.

Areas of interest

From a fleet trend perspective coming out of the pandemic, most airlines focused on the reintroduction of A320 and B737 narrowbody aircraft to meet the surge in passenger traffic, according to Mehas. “The theme over the past three years has been building value bench strength by creating the proverbial one-stop-shop,” he says. “Small to medium independent MROs may be on the outside looking in over the next decade. At AMETEK MRO we also see military MRO as a focus area considering the geopolitical situation worldwide, even if the commercial aftermarket remains our market of choice. Additionally, strong growth in the business jet aircraft arena continues to present us with new opportunities as well.”

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According to McReynolds, an important point is the MRO eco‑system and its evolution whereby, from a customer perspective, there is more of a binary decision on support. “However, with the number of older aircraft operating and a more disciplined new product delivery pipeline, the MRO/support network is much more collaborative with the OEMs,” he says. “Now more than ever, we find ourselves working with the OEMs to provide support in different ways spanning the entire spectrum – from new aircraft through older out-of-production aircraft.”

Technology has expanded to the point where modernisation is an important opportunity, affirms McReynolds. “In the commercial side of aircraft maintenance, the possibilities are abundant in terms of publications, work instructions, packaging and digitisation,” he says. “The challenge for us lies in the sheer scale of operations across OEM platforms. While there is digital opportunity at the airlines, their operations tend to be limited to the number of OEM airframes they operate, so they can focus and get benefit on scale, whereas in business aviation we work across all OEMs, each with unique work scopes, so there is an incremental level of complexity involved.”

Efficiency is a big opportunity in this segment, as ways are figured out to create repeatability, observes McReynolds. “We are looking at it from the way we do engineering and work instructions down the floor where we do inspections. There is just so much scale that if one can cut a little waste out of the process, it has huge benefits,” he says.

Retrofitting solutions

The new wave of technology will disrupt the market in the next few years, and it will be interesting to see how the market responds, according to McReynolds. “Meanwhile, we continue to see upgrades in Wi-Fi and, with the older aircraft operating longer, the related retrofits/ modifications continue to be a big market,” he explains. “We have also expanded capacity across the spectrum for modifications to support the demand for non-maintenance activity – jobs such as avionics install, paint, interior and cabinetry.”

Avionics upgrades are a good example for older airframes being brought up to the newest standards, highlights Mehas. “The same holds true for the conversions from passenger to cargo aircraft – including both widebody and narrowbody aircraft – and it is evident that the MROs are increasingly involved with these programmes,” he says. “Furthermore, green technologies such as the utilisation of biofuel and other sustainability initiatives are always at the forefront. Our key strength is our partnership with the OEMs, and we are seeing expansion of OEM controlled upgrades that do not require a full certification process.”

This feature was first published in MRO Management – March 2024. To read the magazine in full, click here.