The Filton engineering centre will focus on aircraft wing structure design and manufacture. Over 100 engineers are expected to be based at the site.
“Bristol is now established as the heart of our global wing structures manufacturing activity," says Rich Oldfield, Technical Director, GKN Aerospace.
"With the National Composites Centre close by and strong links into local academic research programmes, this is the ideal base for developing our engineering capability. This move marks an important stage in the global re-shaping of engineering at GKN Aerospace, helping us maintain and extend the technology leads we have established across our businesses. Our intention is to continue to grow the design-and-build capability based at each of our engineering centres in the coming years.”
Over 50 permanent staff are already in place at the Filton centre and a recruitment programme is underway to fill the remaining posts. The Filton centre will integrate with the company’s other established engineering centres – on the Isle of Wight in the UK and St. Louis, Garden Grove and Santa Ana in the USA.
This growing team, mainly based across the four engineering centres, will operate as a single global engineering force supporting over 25 GKN Aerospace manufacturing centres worldwide. They will progress product design and analysis and advance new manufacturing technologies and techniques, with each site leading on a defined area of expertise.
