Engineering is Moving Global

Into the unknown
After a difficult start, Western aerospace players are taking Russian industry more seriously and employing local engineers in increasing numbers

Flight International 08/08/05

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The biggest Western aerospace player in Russia is Boeing, with its design centre spread over seven floors in the McDonalds building where engineers work on 747 drawings as shoppers throng one of Moscow's more upmarket streets outside.

Boeing's ambitions in Russia are more complex than those of UTC and it has grown from around a dozen engineers in 1998 to more than 900, of varying levels of seniority, in Russia today. Another Russian - Sergey Kravchenko - heads the operation and constantly fights to secure more and higher value work from Boeing.

Earlier activities centred on relatively modest 777 and 757 modifications, but today the Moscow business has major roles in the design of the 747 Special Freighter conversion and Large Cargo Freighter for transporting 787 modules.
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Boeing Commercial Airplanes vice-president engineering Mike Denton explains that a primary objective is to hire world-class engineering talent globally...
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But Denton adds: "We also hope it helps us with future sales of aircraft. Employees of Boeing get nervous about losing their jobs, but part of our rationale has been that we want to sell aircraft."

The brutal truth is that lower costs in Russia and elsewhere are crucial. Denton explains: "We can get really good talent in structural design at more affordable prices than for the same kind of engineers in the USA. That can make a business case go from negative to positive.
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A bigger issue is understanding what work can be placed abroad while remaining within the US International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) and Export Administration Regulations (EAR).
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Airbus's equivalent of the Boeing centre is its ECAR engineering centre, formed in co-operation with Russian holding company Kaskol. It is much younger than the Boeing operation, having emerged from a government-to-government agreement spearheaded by France. An initial 25 engineers were trained in Toulouse, growing to 120 today and a planned 200 by the end of 2006.

Jobs have been moving global for some time now. Sometimes to help secure sales, sometimes to find cheaper labor, and sometimes to find talent. However, the global market for engineering is just beginning. Where will the jobs be in 2020?

Aerospace | Engineering