Edgewing opens GCAP engineering site in Turin

The Italian facility is the first of three planned engineering hubs for the Global Combat Air Programme, with sites in Japan and the UK to follow in coming months.

Edgewing has opened an engineering facility in Turin, Italy, that will sustain thousands of highly skilled engineering jobs in the region. Its workforce and supply chain will contribute to the development of the next-generation combat aircraft for Italy, Japan and the United Kingdom under the Global Combat Air Programme (GCAP).

Turin is the first additional Edgewing site to open for engineering activities since the joint GCAP Agency-Edgewing headquarters was established in Reading, UK, in 2025. It is the first of three planned facilities, with sites in Japan and the UK to open in coming months. All three will play the same role, as engineering hubs contributing to the delivery of the programme.

The fighter will feature advanced sensing and communications, AI support for pilots and stealth technology. It will deliver surveillance and strike missions at long range in heavily contested airspace, contribute to the strategic operating picture and direct drones and other assets in the battle as a flying “team captain”.

The Turin site will be home to engineers from all three nations, with its initial cohort comprising secondees from Edgewing’s three partner companies. Some secondees have moved their lives and families as far as 10,000km from Japan to Turin.

Edgewing has located the facility alongside Leonardo, which has a long history of combat air technology research and development in Turin that Edgewing will be able to draw on. Leonardo is one of the three equal owners of Edgewing, alongside Japan Aircraft Industrial Enhancement Co (JAIEC) and the UK’s BAE Systems.

Marco Zoff, CEO of Edgewing, says: “Our new site in Italy is the latest step in Edgewing’s rapid growth as an organisation, as we scale up the company across our three nations. Ready to disrupt the defence industry by delivering dramatically quicker than previous generation programmes, the innovation and energy we can access here in Turin will underpin our acceleration.”

Lorenzo Mariani, CEO and general manager of Leonardo, adds: “GCAP will ensure technological sovereignty for generations to come and I am proud that hundreds of engineers here in Turin, and thousands more around the country, will contribute to its success.”