By Aimée Turner in London
British Airways Engineering's move to seal its Team757 maintenance partnership with Icelandair Technical Services and Volvo Aero to support Boeing 757 operators consolidates what it views as a discrete third-party activity designed to establish a brand, and is not indicative of a move to spin off in-house aircraft maintenance.
All three MROs have worked together before. British Airways in 2004 sealed a $100 million inventory management deal with Volvo, under which the Swedish firm sells surplus BA spares while Icelandair uses BA for component maintenance and Volvo for spares.
Significantly, Icelandair Technical Services will be the lead Team757 partner as integrator and client contract holder, heading technical management of the fleet and heavy maintenance, negotiating best MRO rates for its clients.
Volvo, already heavily committed to spares distribution for Boeing aircraft no longer in production, will be responsible for inventory availability and logistics, while BA - a 757 launch customer operating 13 eight- to 17-year-old aircraft - will supervise component support, building on its existing 80% in-house capability. BA business development manager Gaynor Castle says Team757 brings together the partners' strengths in aircraft and technical maintenance, inventory and material support, component repair and line maintenance.
In response to industry comment questioning the third-party 757 potential and BA's true motivation in partnering with small MRO businesses that are members of groups which have proved themselves aggressive in their recent development strategies, Castle says: "The primary objective, our engineering reason for existing, is to look after what is in BA's fleet."
Source: Flight International
