For the seventh time around, MTU Aero Engines has honored suppliers for their outstanding performance. On the occasion of this year's Supplier Day, which was held in Munich in early November, the MTU Supplier Awards were presented to six companies in five categories. MTU's Chief Operating Officer Lars Wagner explained: "With this award, which is a substantial part of our supplier management, we want to honor excellent achievements of our suppliers."

Germany's leading engine manufacturer cooperates with around 6,500 suppliers from all over the world and currently purchases around 35,000 different parts from them – from the smallest bolt all the way to high-tech components. MTU invites its major national and international suppliers to an exchange of experience and expertise every two years. This year, more than 140 senior-level representatives of 70 different companies from 16 countries accepted the invitation.

The visit to Munich was definitely worth it for six of the participating companies: They were presented with the 2018 MTU Supplier Awards. This year's winners include Hanwha Aerospace Co. Ltd. (Korea/Vietnam) in the Efficiency category, Senior Aerospace and Leistritz (both from Thailand) in the Quality category, and Austria's voestalpine BOHLER Aerospace GmbH in the Logistics category. In addition, Germany's ALMECON Technologie GmbH was honored for outstanding innovations and Mexico-based Walbar Engine Components for excellent cooperation.

Top on the agenda of this year's meeting was the massive production ramp-up, an issue of central importance to MTU and the entire aviation industry at present. Given the huge market success of the geared turbofan engine, which is being built in several versions by U.S. company Pratt & Whitney in cooperation with MTU, the Munich-based engine manufacturer currently has to cope with the biggest production ramp-up in its history. The company's order books are full and component volumes are set to increase sharply – and this development shows no sign of abating: By the year 2022, production volumes will have doubled as compared with 2016. "To be able to tackle this big challenge we continue to invest heavily in the expansion of our production and maintenance facilities around the world," said COO Wagner, adding that the company has already advanced half-way towards achieving its goals.

For Erwin Pignitter, Senior Vice President, Procurement and Logistics at MTU, a strong network of suppliers in conjunction with close cooperation as partners is a major key to success: "Only if we work shoulder to shoulder, meet the highest quality standard and put stable processes in place can we all stay on track and benefit from the future growth." Pignitter sees the production ramp-up as a big challenge, but is convinced that the efforts will pay off. "Over the next few years, we expect our industry to grow at an average rate of around seven percent annually." With the technologies developed for the geared turbofan, MTU is excellently positioned in the narrowbody engine market. On top of this, it has also successfully established itself in the market for widebody engines. In this growing business segment, MTU cooperates with U.S. engine manufacturer GE Aviation and is responsible for the turbine center frames of several engine models.