The USA should not interpret recent efforts to consolidate the French and European aerospace industries as protectionism, Jean-Paul Bechat, chairman of the French Aerospace Industries Association (GIFAS) said yesterday.
"Our message to our American partners is that we are fully ready to have continuing transatlantic links and cooperation but they must be efficient relationships between equals," he said.
To achieve this, "...you need to have balanced partnerships in terms of knowhow and market share.
"Otherwise, one is a follower and the leader has a feeling he's giving away technology. And if the leader is not happy, neither is the follower."The fact that potential European partners are reinforcing themselves is a plus, he insists.
"It should not be seen by the Americans as a threat to their interests. They can hardly reproach our consolidation efforts and the following day set about merging Boeing and McDonnell Douglas"
He was responding, he said, to recent comments along these lines made by the US secretary of state and other industry officials.
Bechat says the French industry has evolved appreciably since the last Paris air show in 1997. "We have seen the merger of Thomson CSF and Dassault Electronics, old competitors in the radar field, and it has certainly been useful to unite these companies.
Similarly, the merger between Aerospatiale and Matra Haute Technologie to create Aerospatiale-Matra will be beneficial."
Both these deals have secondary consequences, he says, such as linking Aerospatiale's satellite activities with those of Alcatel to create Alcatel Space.
Consolidation
It has also facilitated a pan-European consolidation in the missile arena to create Matra-BAe Dynamics, which will be reinforced by Aerospatiale's missiles activity and that of their investments in the German and Italian sectors.
Bechat feels the French industry now has no significant problems with regard to further integration.
With so much attention being paid to the big corporations, however, it would be wrong to ignore the components manufacturing industry where the main European players are "significantly smaller and more fragmented than their US counterparts".
"On this front, there is still work to be done," he says.
He believes that the Airbus Industrie structure has to be modernised and improved.
He supports the view of consortium chief executive Noel Forgeard that until a separate corporate entity was created, it is difficult to synch-ronise authority on the engineering development of the A3XX, A340-500/600 and A318.
Source: Flight Daily News
