Having become one of the world’s largest pilot training and flight simulator companies in a relatively short time, L3 Commercial Training Solutions (CTS), part of New York-based L3 Technologies’s (Chalet 306, Static C2) L3 Link Simulation & Training unit, is at the 2017 Paris Air Show highlighting its capabilities, plans and latest investments. Continuing on a growth trajectory, the company has increased revenues to about $300 million from $100 million in the past three to four years, said Alan Crawford, L3-CTS president. “We have also grown from 300 to 1,200 employees in 14 locations.”
Central in parent company L3 Link’s plans has been the huge need to train new commercial pilots over the coming decades. This prompted the U.S. company to branch out five years ago from military training, mainly through the acquisition of Thales Training and Simulation’s civil business (in August 2012) and UK-based global training provider CTC (in May 2015). This will allow it to promote turnkey training solutions to airlines around the world. “We want to be the partner of choice and provide more customized solutions to airlines,” said Crawford. “The MPL [multi-crew pilot license] gives us a fantastic opportunity to offer a more turnkey approach,” with packages often including the provision of simulators as well.
Strategic Plan
Crawford told AIN during a visit to its simulator production and training facility in Crawley, near London Gatwick Airport, that L3 Link realized the quickest way to become a commercial aviation training provider was through acquisitions. “But last year we realized we still had gaps. We were strong in full-flight simulators,” he explained, but the company had nothing to meet the trend towards less complex flight training devices and task trainers. It also did not have Chinese CAAC approvals. “So we acquired Aerosim in September 2016. They produce FNPT IIs [approved flight and navigation procedure trainers] and other trainers and have an academy at Sanford in Florida, with 400 to 500 cadets a year.” Aerosim has FAA Part 141 approval and is the equal in size to the largest CAA-approved training center, according to Crawford, with approval to train up to 330 Chinese students a year.
L3-CTS, which launched a rebranding three months ago, he said, "is now focusing on training systems, both here and in Minnesota; training courses, for example in Bangkok and Singapore as well as growing here; and the Airline Academy [formerly CTC Aviation].” The academy has bases in the UK, centered at Bournemouth (but also with activities at Southampton and Coventry), the U.S. (various locations), New Zealand (Hamilton) and Bangkok (as a joint venture with Bangkok Airways). “We are seeing lots of growth in the MPL in particular,” he added. The Airline Academy is training “a bit over 1,000 cadets this year but we still have strong room to grow. We’re looking now to expand,” said Crawford.
Part of this growth will be served by a new $150 million, eight-bay training facility now being constructed near Gatwick Airport. “This is the facility we’ll be moving to,” he said. “It’s a large project to create a new training center and production facility [for our simulators].” The complex will be behind the training center and will be capable of producing up to 30 full-flight simulators (FFS) a year, up from 20 at the current facility.
“We have delivered simulators to some 200 airlines since 1990 [as Thales and now as L3], and there are probably 30 to 40 customers we offer more [of our products and services] to, such as cadet training.” He suggested also that more, larger airlines that have traditionally had their own training organizations wanted to outsource their training, as some started to do years ago with maintenance.
Pilot Shortage
At the moment, the company’s focus is “especially on Gatwick, but in the next two to three years, with the partnership model, we expect to move into other regions,” said Crawford. “We’re also looking to invest in capacity in our academy—for example at Aerosim—including expansion of the [training aircraft] fleet.”
Crawford also said that airlines are increasingly saying, “I don’t want 10 cadets a year I want 100,” driven by growth, retirements and the introduction of new aircraft types. And in some regions, raising the pilot retirement age from 60 to 65 is going to create a "bow wave," he predicted.
So tailoring packages for operators is L3-CTS’s key business push, he explained. “Customers have a choice, they can fly in New Zealand, the UK or the U.S., and choose a package and structure a program.” Meanwhile L3-CTS is suggesting to airlines that they should make commitments to cadets early on. “We are now seeing airlines coming in during ground school and tagging pilots, often to add additional cadets at a slightly later date” to their main roster.
“That’s something new,” he said, while adding, “There’s a need for more airline sponsorship of cadets. We all need to work together to meet the pilot shortage and [it’s best when] cadets are specifically trained for the aircraft [and airline] they’re going to fly.” He said that Virgin is now running an MPL program to put first officers straight into the right seat of its Airbus A330 long-haul jets.
Simulator Flight
AIN viewed L3’s current Crawley facility, where four training simulators are located, as well as four bays where simulators are in various stages of construction. Mitesh Patel, L3-CTS v-p sales, marketing and customer excellence, said the whole building was purely a manufacturing center when it was part of Thales, but now there is a partition wall from the Thales military simulator work. So L3-CTS has half the building for its eight bays, until it moves into its own building in the third quarter of 2018. The L3 part was transformed into half a training center due to CTC’s “huge demand for simulator [time], and six months later we acquired them,” said Patel.
AIN had the opportunity to fly L3’s Reality7 Boeing 737-800 FFS, which was extremely realistic. (The visual system for the next simulator is currently being fitted with 4K projectors, for even greater realism.) A flight out of Innsbruck, then around in a wide circuit at 10,000 feet over the Alpine valleys and back for a tight left-base into Innsbruck (with an okay landing!) was enough to show how capable the Reality7 is. Patel sat in the right seat while Ian Dyne ran the simulator.
The center has two A320-family FFS (one is currently being built and is due to be certified by the end of September) and two 737NGs. There is also a Boeing 787 FFS underway.