Airbus high flye eer touches down; 'I have achieved more than I ever thought I would.' Brian Fleet talks to David Jones about life at Airbus.

Byline: David Jones 

THE man who helped mastermind the rise and rise of Deeside as the world's top site for the manufacture of airliner wings is to step down.

Brian Fleet said that, after almost a decade as the boss at Airbus's wing-making plant at Broughton, near Chester, the time was right for him to "pass the baton" for the development of the next generation of the company's aircraft to someone else.

"I am now in my 36th year in the business, and I have achieved more than I ever thought I would," he said.

"I have been involved with many fantastic programmes, including the A380 and now the A350. I want to give my successor time to get his feet under the table before the development of the 30X - the replacement for the single aisle A320 family.

"It is important to have continuity - and I have been at the helm of this business for 10 years."

Mr Fleet, who will be 54 when he retires at the end of March next year, rose from engineering apprentice with the then Hawker Siddeley factory, in Flintshire, in 1974, to head one of Deeside's biggest employers.

plant in He is Airbus's UK senior vice-president and head of Centre of Excellence for Wing & Pylon. As such, he has had responsibility for four Airbus sites - two of them in the UK and one each in France and Germany. He is based at Chester Broughton, where the wing production for all variants of Airbus commercial airliners takes place.

He said: "I''m very proud of the time I''ve spent at Airbus and everything we as a company and team have achieved in Broughton, Filton, Bremen and St Eloi.

"I''ve been a part of the wing production for every aircraft in the Airbus family, from the A300 to the A380, which is a rare honour.

"I never would have believed when I was a young engineering apprentice that I would one day have the opportunity to lead this site. We have a great workforce, a great team and a great team spirit, and together we make a wonderful product."

Mr Fleet, who lives in Bebington, Wirral, said the enormous mileage he had chalked up flying between the sites over past years had meant he was often away from home. He said that one of the reasons he had decided to step down now was so that he could spend more time with his wife, Debbie. The couple have three grown-up children.

Airbus has had to surmount numerous difficulties in recent years - delays to the superjumbo programme and a drop in orders caused by the global recession among them.

Mr Fleet admitted that there had been "challenges" along the way, but the company had always found ways to meet those challenges and would do so again.

But, asked whether he had found the job of leading the aerospace centre stressful in today's demanding business climate, he replied: "Not really, I have been in senior management positions for 27 years - more than half of my life.

"It has not been stressful, but there have been challenges."

Airbus, the civilian aircraft division of parent company EADS, has attracted millions of pounds in launch aid from the UK, French, German and Spanish governments for the development of new aircraft over recent years.

The latest project, the A350, has secured pounds 340m in launch aid from the UK Government, an investment that has helped clinch the work on the new airliner's wing for Broughton, safeguarding more than 1,000 jobs there.

But state aid for the aircraft development programmes - typically a third of the multi-billion pound cost of each huge project - has been mired in controversy, adding a further headache for Airbus bosses.

The US has gone to the Genevabased World Trade Organisation to challenge the state aid given to the Airbus projects and an interim ruling, yet to be made public and confirmed, was issued a few weeks ago.

Whatever the outcome of the WTO cases - Europe has lodged its own complaint against alleged illegal subsidies paid to Airbus's US archrival, Boeing - the A350 wings will go into production at Broughton next year. The new North factory, site of their manufacture, is now being built.

Mr Fleet told LDP Business: "I think the support of the Government for this type of initiative is essential, both now and going forward."

A new generation of apprentices is being trained at the Deeside site to work on the new materials and technologies needed to build the A350 wings.

He began his near four-decade career, and 30 years in Broughton, as an engineering apprentice in 1974 when the site was part of British Aerospace, later BAE Systems, until the creation of the Airbus singleintegrated company in 2001.

He began taking increasingly senior roles within the business, and in 1995 he moved from the Airbus division management team in British Aerospace to take up a key role in another branch of the company, becoming director of the Royal Ordnance small arms ammunition business, based at Radway Green, in Crewe, Cheshire.

In 1998, he was appointed managing director of Heckler and Koch, in Germany. He subsequently returned to Airbus in Broughton and his roots in the commercial aerospace sector.

He has described his return as the top man at Broughton as one of the happiest days of his life, and today he adds: "It was a huge sense of fulfilment because my heart was here."

Gerard Weber, Airbus executive vice-president, operations, said: "Up until March, Brian will continue to lead the Centre of Excellence Wing and Pylon, and to display the same commitment and vigour as he has done for many years."

Workers at the Broughton factory were quick to pay tribute to the man whose commitment to the site, they said, had never been in doubt.

Terry Dillon, union convenor, said: "His heart is in Broughton and we will be sorry to see him go because he has been a bloody good salesman for this site.

"Whoever takes over from him has a very hard act to follow, but we hope the person who steps into his shoes will show the same commitment to the site that he has over the years."

Mr Dillon said Mr Fleet had never missed an opportunity to bend the ear of Government ministers and other VIP visitors to Broughton, extolling the plant's record of excellence as a world-leading centre of aerospace expertise.

"His efforts have had a lot to do with the growth of the site in recent years and he will be sorely missed."

Mr Fleet's replacement is expected to be named some time over the coming months.

[e-mail] Ten years that have seen pounds 2.5bn invested and 4,000 pairs of wings built BRIAN FLEET is one of the region's best-known industrialists.

As the head of a factory making wings for Airbus airliners, he has indirectly played a part in ensuring that countless hundreds of millions of holidaymakers can jet off on holiday and that business people can get to vital meetings around the world.

During the decade, he has successfully overseen the building and equipping of major new factories at Broughton to build the wings for the A380 superjumbo and now the extra wide-bodied A350 - the company's latest civilian plane, due in service in a few years' time.

The A350 will be the first Airbus commercial jet to extensively use carbon fibre materials in its construction in order to make it more fuelefficient.

The development will help move the Broughton site into a new technological phase of its long aviation history.

Mr Fleet told LDP Business that, over the past 10 years, pounds 2.5bn had been invested in the West and North factories - for A380 and A350 wing manufacture, respectively - and other facilities.

During his time in charge at Broughton, an estimated 3,000 to 4,000 sets of aircraft wings have been made there and dispatched to France and Germany for final assembly.

The wing-making site employs 6,500 Airbus staff from Merseyside, Cheshire and North Wales, and another 2,000 in companies providing services to the factory complex.

Asked to name a highlight of his time at Broughton, Mr Fleet said he would never forget the day a few years ago when he and colleagues at the site watched on a giant screen as the A380 superjumbo - the world's biggest passenger plane - first took to the air: "A huge cheer went up from the guys as the aircraft took off so elegantly. I will probably never, ever see anything like that again."

But he added that he was also delighted that he had been able to secure for Broughton the programme to build the wings for the new A350 extra wide bodied airliner, a success that will go a long way in securing future employment at the site.

CAPTION(S):

An A380 superjumbo flies over Chester Brian Fleet - standing down as boss of Airbus's Broughton wing-ma aaking factory, after 35 years