Earning Their Wings

They say the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. In the Inland Northwest, aerospace manufacturers are counting on that cliche being true.

A number of airplane components and parts are made in the greater Spokane area, and many of those manufacturers are banding together in hopes of collectively becoming a tier-one Boeing Co. contractor, defined as a company that can contract directly with Boeing, instead of with other contractors and subcontractors.

Getting qualified as a tier-one contractor at Boeing would be huge for a lot of our members, says Michael Mooney, co-director of the Inland Northwest Aerospace Consortium (INWAC), a local trade organization. They want to be able to bid projects as a group.

To that end, the Consortium has created the Manufacturing Services Network, through which it markets a group of local companies as a single source for potential customers. Getting that tier-one status is also the Consortiums biggest challenge because as a consortium, it would be more difficult for the companies to speak with a single voice; instead, theyd act for the benefit of the group over the needs of any individual company.

Many INWAC-affiliated companies have well-established relationships with Boeing that are decades old, but the concern is for several of the smaller companies that could be cut from the equation if Boeing looks to eliminate suppliers, essentially getting its parts from fewer sources. The general trend with Boeing has been to reduce its number of suppliers, Mooney says, adding that no one among the Consortiums companies is currently threatened with losing a contract. Todd Woodard, the other co-director of INWAC, says the group could position itself as an affordable, nearby contractor for the big airplane maker.

The Consortium hasnt secured that tier-one status from Boeing yet, but in a relatively short amount of timefive yearsit has been able to do something else: It has made the cluster of aerospace manufacturers in the Inland Northwest part of the statewide aerospace conversation.

At last count, more than 80 companies in the Inland Northwest make some sort of airplane component or part. Collectively, according to a 2007 study, those businesses employ a total of 8,100 workers with a total payroll of $325 million.

To illustrate the regions role in airplane manufacturing, the Consortium took a photograph of a Boeing 747 and drew arrows pointing to different components made by Spokane-area companies. About 30 firms produce parts for the 747 alone. For example, Triumph Composite Systems Inc. makes floor panels and ducting for airplanes at its 500-plus-employee plant west of Spokane. Nearby, a 130-person Goodrich Corp. plant makes carbon-fiber aircraft brakes, and Liberty Lake-based Altek Inc. turns out custom airplane components and does assembly work at its 200-person shop.

Do they do aerospace in Spokane? Before INWAC, nobody knew, says Mooney, noting that the organization now has a representative on Gov. Chris Gregoires Washington Council for Aerospace and that it sponsored the 2009 Governors Annual Aerospace Conference in Spokane. Now, everybody knows.

In addition to organizing as a tier-one contractor, the group is involved in helping its members become more attractive suppliers and recruiting new aerospace companies to the Inland Northwest.

Woodard says the organization has helped some of its membersInland Northwest Metallurgical Services Inc. and metal finishing company Novation among themachieve certification from the International Organization for Standardization, better known as the ISO certification, which essentially proves quality management systems are in place and that a manufacturing operation is sophisticated.

With business recruiting, some of the companies involved in the Consortium had a hand in landing the manufacturing operations for Titan Spring Inc., which is headquartered in North Hollywood, Calif. Titan Spring, which makes a variety of springs used in different aerospace components, relocated in 2007 to Hayden Lake, Idaho. While not in Washington state, the relocation was considered a win for the Inland Northwest.

As a region, we dont care about the Washington-Idaho border, Woodard says. We have people who live here and go over there to work and vice versa.

Generally speaking, the groups goal is to set the aerospace clusters supply chain all within a 30-mile radius of Spokane. The need to have more aerospace-industry services became apparent about three years ago when a study prepared for the Consortium indicated that the aerospace industry is robust in the Spokane area, but 54 cents of every dollar spent by local aerospace companies was leaving the region for some sort of component or service.

Aerospace business recruitment also is important for Woodards primary employer, the Spokane International Airport. This facility has begun using the slogan Generating Economic Growth, playing off the GEG three-letter airport identifier for Spokane InternationalGEG comes from the airports previous name, Geiger Field.

Woodard, who is also director of marketing and public relations at Spokane International, said the airport board has made a priority of increasing its nonairline-related revenue. One way the airport is looking to do that is by attracting more aerospace-related businesses to lease space in airport-owned buildings and hangars.

Nonairline revenue can help to lower the fees the airport charges to airlines, which, in theory, allows more airlines to offer more flights to and from Spokane, he explains.

In some ways, the Consortiums role in business development and recruiting goes all the way back to its roots. Woodard says the Spokane business community first became aware of the aerospace industrys prevalence in the region in the mid-2000s, when Spokane International and the Spokane Area Economic Development Council researched the subject in response to a request from Airbus. The airplane maker was looking nationwide for a place to build a new manufacturing facility and had a multipage questionnaire for interested communities to fill out.

Woodard notes Airbus eventually chose to locate its plant in Alabama, but he was surprised to find, We could answer most of their questions positively and with a straight face.

A short time later, Mooney, representing Triumph Composite Systems, participated in a manufacturing roundtable sponsored by the Spokane Area Chamber of Commercethe Chamber and the Spokane EDC since have merged to form Greater Spokane Inc. He met another aerospace manufacturer there, and they decided to get their own industry-specific group together.

The initial meeting consisted only of what they called the Ricks and Mikes. It involved Mike Mooney and Rick Pederson of Triumph (Pederson has since left the company), Mike Marzetta and Rick Taylor of Altek and Rick Pickel of Haskins Steel.

With the group now 80-some members strong, up from just five in 2005, Mooney says, There is more aerospace going on than there was five years ago, and were more organized than we were five years ago. It always amazes me how many people in aerospace know INWAC.