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Airbus is close to finalising a deal to take over some of supplier Spirit AeroSystems’ facilities, including the company’s Belfast site in Northern Ireland, with an agreement expected to be unveiled as early as next week.
The European plane maker has been in talks with Spirit since last year as part of a wider deal that will see US rival Boeing take over the struggling aerostructures supplier it first spun out two decades ago.
Under the deal, Airbus will carve out the work done by Spirit for its key programmes, notably for its A350 and A220 jets, across sites in Belfast, North Carolina, Morocco and France.
Amid protracted talks between the companies, much of the attention has focused on the fate of Spirit’s UK sites in Belfast and Prestwick in Scotland.
Spirit’s Belfast operations — which span six sites — build the wings and mid-fuselage sections for the Airbus A220 aircraft programme. But they also manufacture fuselage sections and other critical components for a range of business jets built by Canada’s Bombardier.
The operations, which employ about 3,500 people, are integral to the region’s thriving aerospace industry. The Belfast facilities, which are part of the historic Short Brothers factory, also carry out maintenance and repair work for other aviation customers.
With Airbus focused on securing the work on the A220 wings and mid-fuselage sections, efforts have been made to find a third-party buyer for the remaining parts of the business. Unions have previously raised concerns that splitting the rest of the operations would pose practical problems and leave in limbo the 60 per cent of workers not involved in Airbus production.
Newly filed accounts state that the company expects to divest the A220 wing programme this year. The accounts, filed by Short Brothers at Companies House, add that if a third-party buyer has not been “identified and agreed” by the date of Boeing’s takeover of Spirit — expected in July — then Short Brothers will become a “wholly owned subsidiary” of the US plane maker.
The future of Spirit’s plant in Prestwick, which provides components for Airbus programmes including the A350 and A320, has been similarly complicated. However, under the original outline agreement, Airbus will take over the site in the event that a third-party sale is not successful.
Thomas Toepfer, Airbus’s chief financial officer, told investors at the company’s annual meeting earlier this month that it expected to finalise a deal by the end of April.
Airbus and Spirit declined to comment on Friday.
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