Why JorAMCo is so happy to have competition

With a distinguished career as a pilot behind him – several years of which was as King Hussein's pilot on Jordan's head-of-state Tristar – Bashir looks at the growth of competitive MRO facilities that are springing up around the Middle East, particularly the Gulf, and believes it is “good news”

Bashir’s view is simple. All of the MRO operations will benefit as the region’s reputation for quality increases and any doubts about sending valuable assets to the Middle East for maintenance or repairs are eradicated.

“We are not in collaboration with any other MRO, but we have good relations. It is good to have strong players and I believe in regional strength as it brings up the market.”

Like many of the aviation businesses in Jordan , JorAMCo came out of the pre-privatisation break-up of Royal Jordanian. As Jordan Aircraft Maintenance Company, to give it its full name, was separated, more than 90 per cent of its business was Royal Jordanian. Now, nine years later, third-party work has a clear majority.

Owned by UAE investment house Abraaj (80 per cent) and Royal Jordanian (20 per cent) since 2005, the company has both invested and expanded. A new hangar was built adding 13,000sqm of capacity to the 16,000sqm of award-winning hangar that already existed. Improvements were made to the hangar and the aprons.

“Abraaj is about more than capital,” said Bashir. “They also bring strategy. We sat down with them and agreed that JorAMCo needed to look outside the borders of the region and become a world-class organisation.

“We can take 13 narrowbodies in the hangar at any one time, so we began looking at a potential market five or six hours from Amman . Jordan is already well known for its excellent labour force and its cost base. With our experience, particularly with Airbus 310 and 320 and our commitment to a continuous improvement process, a number of new customers have come to us and we have trebled our revenues.”

JorAMCo’s position with free zone status at the heart of Queen Alia International Airport has led to customers coming from Turkey , Kuwait , Saudi Arabia , Spain , USA , Austria , Russia and, most of all, India . “We now have virtually all of the Indian airlines among our customers,” Bashir said. “Our offer of quality, price, turn-round time and flexibility means we can meet changing requirements.

“Our approach is one of transparency. Customers can go to the aircraft any time they want and if they need meetings at any time we are available at all levels. Our view is that once the aircraft is here, the contract negotiation is over and then we work together as partners with the objective to get it out of here as soon as possible and back in the hands of a happy customer.”

The success with the Indian airlines has been so great that JorAMCo is studying the prospects of opening a maintenance shop in India to meet the demand. “We look at opportunities. The economy is tough. It is tough for everyone. We are taking steps now with restructuring. We know things will recover and we will be ready,” Bashir said.

JorAMCo has taken one step and created its own maintenance academy.

Chief operating officer Nick White joined the MRO from Air Deccan earlier this year. “The academy is a great idea,” he said. “We need 100 trainees at any one time. They get to learn on the job; they learn technical English and we get some great engineers.”

The engineers study for the UK CAA’s Part 66 licence. The first class will graduate in 2011. “This is a strategic requirement for us. We have mostly Jordanian nationals and they are a committed group with a high standard of work. We will be ready for the upturn when it comes.”

JorAMCo will be at the Dubai Air Show and Bashir hopes that his simple message will be picked up by the many official airline delegations attending.

“We want people to go away knowing that we are a serious company that is large enough to deal with the needs of an airline and yet small enough to be focused on the smaller details. We are not after becoming a mega-company. We know the first obstacle is getting the first aircraft but we genuinely believe that if people try us with one aircraft, others will follow.”

Having tripled revenue, there is no question that JorAMCo is a sound investment for Abraaj and RJ and the investment continues. A new 13,000sqm hangar has opened and a 16,000sqm new hangar has followed, giving the MRO the capacity to receive 13 aircraft at any one time.

JorAMCo is gearing up for the new families of widebodies that will hit the market in the next few years. “We are ready for the A350 and the B787,” Bashir said. “We are a realistic opportunistic company. Of course we have been affected by the downturn in the economy and we have had to deal with it and take actions – but I am optimistic about the future.”