When Adam Truso returned to Vermont after flying Black Hawk helicopters in Iraq, he wanted to transition to civilian employment.
But most of what he found in the want ads were jobs as nurses and Walmart greeters, Truso said. Wasn’t he surprised when a contact from the Vermont Department of Labor introduced him to Liquid Measurement Systems in Georgia.
The manufacturing company is the sole supplier of carbon-fiber fuel gauges for Black Hawks, plus Boeing’s CH-47 Fox model Army helicopters, an entire line of auxiliary fuel tanks by Robertson Fuel Systems, and the experimental Sikorsky X-2 helicopter that holds a helicopter speed record of 259 mph.
Truso now works in the sales and marketing division for LMS — a company considered an anchor in Vermont’s $2 billion aviation and aeronautics industry.
Air prowess was on display Thursday at the Burlington International Airport for the state’s first Aerospace and Aviation Trade Show, hosted by the Vermont Chamber of Commerce.
“We’ve never had a trade show just for the aerospace and aviation industries,” said Chris Carrigan, the chamber’s vice president of business development. The organization has held 14 “matchmaking” sessions for the industries since 2008, where high-level procurement specialists for companies such as Raytheon, Cessna, General Dynamics, Boeing, Rolls Royce and Bombardier meet representatives from Vermont-based companies that manufacture parts they need.
The matchmaking was helpful, manufacturers said, but what they needed was a trade show.
Thursday’s event delivered. Several of the 50 exhibitors interrupted an impromptu interview with Carrigan to thank him for pulling the show together. “This is great,” they kept saying. More than 500 people registered in advance to attend.
In addition to manufacturers of parts that range from precision cable connectors to radar shields, exhibitors included auditing and certification providers, supply chain management companies, networking and security specialists, state and federal business resource agencies and schools that train kids and adults for careers in nearly all of those fields.
The lineup reflects Carrigan’s goal for the state: establishing an aviation and aerospace “corridor” between global industry hubs in Montreal and Connecticut, with Vermont as the essential connector.
Integration
To really achieve the “corridor” effect in Vermont, all the moving parts of the industry have to become integrated, Carrigan said.
That’s partly necessitated by the fragmented nature of Vermont’s small businesses. Many exhibitors at the trade show are small, independent businesses with fewer than 50 employees. In competition for major bids, their odds increase the more they work together.
But a different sort of integration is an industry trend in its own right, Truso said. Companies like Sikorsky and Boeing, considered “original equipment manufacturers,” rely on “integrators,” such as London-based BAE Systems.
OEMs have consolidated their supply chains, Carrigan said, meaning that instead of sourcing one part from 30 different suppliers, they want to get it from three or four — or one.
The integrators handle the piecemeal sourcing to meet that need, Truso said. They’ll put together all the parts that go into a fuselage, for example, so they can supply the fuselage whole and ready for plane assembly.
Peaks and valleys
Bidding on these contracts, manufacturing precision parts, putting them all together and assembling the final product is a long progression. So is getting into the highly technical and heavily regulated aviation and aerospace fields, Carrigan said. So building the corridor will take time.
But it’s got traction, he said. The Vermont Aerospace and Aviation Association, a division of the chamber, and its Canadian counterpart, Aero Montreal, already are in touch.
The two groups are putting together a memorandum of understanding “to facilitate regular interaction between our members,” with the goal of boosting cross-border commerce and collaboration. Carrigan said they expect to sign the MOU in December at an innovation and technology forum in Montreal.
Meanwhile, Vermont manufacturers supplying the industry are staying nimble to survive the fluctuations in a high-stakes, volatile market.
Several vendors commented that military contracts have waned recently with federal defense cuts, while the commercial market is picking up due to factors like an aging fleet of planes that need to be replaced, the emergence of a light jet market and a general return of consumer confidence.
To weather the changes, many companies also make parts for more than the aviation and aerospace markets. Gun makers, in particular, are a common client.
CAM Development & Micro Components employs about 10 people in the Hydeville section of Castleton to make all manner of precision metal components. The office manager, Kim Gosselin, said the aviation industry represented about 30 percent of the company’s sales before one of their major buyers went out of business. Now 30 percent to 50 percent of their business is manufacturing firing pins for Sig Sauer and Remington Arms.
Morrisville-based Manufacturing Solutions Inc. also assembles guns, plus indoor rowing equipment for Concept2, another local business. MSI, which specializes in assembly, is looking to break into the aviation market while also expanding to offer supply chain management, warehousing, distribution and even bookkeeping.
Such diverse “business service outsourcing” and customs expertise means teak benches from Denmark may cross paths with perfume from Ireland while educational software and, perhaps soon, aviation components come and go through the town of about 2,000.
Susan Murray, director of the U.S. Export Assistance Center in Vermont, said she’s noticed more aggressive exploration of export markets among the small and medium-sized companies she works with. She thinks it’s a good sign.
Depending on the health of domestic markets, Murray said, attention to international markets grows and wanes.
“I’m seeing more confidence in the domestic market, so companies are more willing to look at the long-term opportunities internationally,” she said.
That’s exactly where Carrigan is aiming.
