Bengaluru. Airbus has inaugurated a state-of-the-art technology centre in Bengaluru, marking a major expansion of its strategic footprint in India. The new facility will serve as a hub for engineering, digital transformation, customer services and procurement, establishing a new nerve centre for the company’s ‘Make in India’ mission.
The ‘Airbus India Technology Centre’ was inaugurated by D K Shivakumar, Deputy Chief Minister of Karnataka and M B Patil, Minister of Industries and Infrastructure of Karnataka. The event was virtually attended and addressed by Rammohan Naidu Kinjarapu, Minister of Civil Aviation, Government of India.
Catherine Jestin, Executive Vice-President Digital, Airbus, and Jürgen Westermeier, President and Managing Director of Airbus in India and South Asia, were also present.
“The inauguration of the ‘Airbus India Technology Centre’ represents a strategic acceleration in our journey in India – it provides the scale and headroom for our next phase of growth,” said Jürgen Westermeier. “This centre will allow us to scale existing technological competencies and innovation ecosystems while also addressing the customer services and procurement dimensions of our ‘Make in India’ mission. It ensures that Indian expertise continues to be woven into every stage of our global value chain.”
While Airbus has been a pillar of the Indian aviation landscape for more than six decades, its focused engineering presence in Bengaluru has matured over the past 20 years from a specialised unit into a multi-dimensional powerhouse.
The new 880,000 sq ft facility is designed to accommodate about 5,000 employees, providing the necessary scale and headroom for the rapid growth Airbus envisions for the region. It is not merely a change of address but a strategic consolidation that brings Engineering and Innovation, Digital, Customer Services and Procurement together with all enabling functions under one roof.
As Airbus’ largest engineering and digital centres outside Europe, the Bengaluru campus serves as the primary engine for Airbus’ “Make in India” strategy. The work performed here is deeply integrated into the entire lifecycle of the aircraft; Indian engineers and digital specialists now help maintain and optimise all existing Airbus commercial aircraft and helicopter programmes. From maintaining critical aircraft technologies to pioneering research into next-generation aircraft, cyber security, robotics and AI, this facility ensures that the innovations of tomorrow are rooted in Indian expertise.
The campus also houses a dedicated Customer Services centre that provides critical support both locally and globally. This centre offers tailored support programmes, flight hour services and comprehensive maintenance and technical support to Airbus customers around the world, ensuring operational excellence across the global fleet.
The Bengaluru campus also functions as a vital Procurement hub and a primary orchestrator of the ‘Make in India’ strategy. These operations are essential to managing the manufacturing, assembly and sourcing of components and services that plug Indian talent into the global value chain.
Airbus has more than tripled its annual sourcing from India — from US$500 million in 2019 to over US$1.5 billion today — and is on track to exceed US$2 billion well before the end of the decade. This strategy is already reflected in the more than 100 Indian companies currently supplying critical components like flap track beams, aircraft doors and helicopter fuselages for global programmes, besides also supporting the final assembly lines for the C295 military transport aircraft in Vadodara and the H125 helicopter in Vemagal, near Bengaluru.
Demonstrating its commitment to the Government of India’s ‘Skill India’ initiative, the facility will host a local chapter of the Airbus Leadership University that will provide tailored development and learning solutions to prepare the next generation of aerospace managers and specialists.
