Safran Aero Boosters, a Liège-based company that specialises in the production of aircraft-engine components, announced on Monday evening the creation of a new compressor blade factory in Marchin, Liège province.
The €50-million investment should lead to the creation of around 100 jobs, it said.
The new industrial site will be dedicated to the production of titanium compressor blades, intended in particular for the LEAP engine designed by the CFM International Consortium - owned 50/50 by French group Safran Aircraft Engines and US company General Electric.
The new company will be called Safran Blades. Its capital will be 56% owned by Safran Aero Boosters and 22% by the SFPI, the federal government's financial arm, with an equivalent stake from Wallonia's regional investment company, SRIW, the company’s CEO, François Lepot, explained.
Lepot was speaking at a press conference at the SAB’s headquarters, in Herstal, alongside the Secretary of State for Recovery and Strategic Investments, Thomas Dermine, and the Walloon Minister for the Economy, Willy Borsus.
The new factory will be located on a site that used to belong to steel group ArcelorMittal. It should start producing compressor blades by the end of 2024 and be fully operational by 2025. It will employ around 100 people – in addition to the 1,500 employees in Herstal – who will produce more than 2,000 blades per day.
Dermine and Borsus welcomed this “reindustrialisation” initiative in Wallonia, since the blades are currently produced in China – with all the attendant geopolitical risks – and in Canada, France and Israel.
“We are and wish to remain world champions in our sector while controlling the security of supply,” Lepot emphasised to the politicians present.
