With the announcement of a new engineering facility in Wichita’s Old Town, Airbus adds another major aviation manufacturing company to the Aviation Capital of the World. Airbus will hire 60 structural and stress design engineers as they plan to open their engineering facility in early 2002.
When Airbus opens its doors in 2002 with the new engineering facility, they will be tapping into a wealth of talent and general aviation industry knowledge that has made Wichita famous. The winner of the “Quality Service Award” presented by Aviation Week and Space Technology, Wichita is home to nearly 45,000 aviation workers and more than 130 aviation-related companies.
“This shows what we’ve been saying this whole time about building industry clusters,” Mayor Bob Knight said. “There’s no other place in the world where a company could find the quantity or quality of aviation engineers than in Wichita. If we didn’t have companies like Boeing, Cessna, Raytheon and Bombardier, Airbus would never have considered landing an office here.”
Airbus joins a proud team of aviation companies including The Boeing Company, Cessna, Raytheon Company and Bombardier Aerospace.
“Our workforce has always been attractive to companies wishing to expand in our community,” Knight said. “Airbus was looking at several North American locations in July, but found from the start that the talent pool in Wichita was superior.”
The facility, which will be located in the heart of Old Town is currently undergoing over $130,000 in renovations to prepare for the new engineering facility. Local companies who are assisting Airbus with the move to Old Town include Goldsmith Inc., Marketplace Properties and Classic Real Estate Inc. Bill Greer of Wichita Aerospace Alliance Group has been assisting Airbus in the development of the business plan for the Wichita engineering office.