On December 19, 2016, Sir Tim Clark, president of Emirates, officially opened AIM Altitude’s new purpose-built facility at Bournemouth Airport in the UK. The 168,000ft² facility brings the whole of AIM Altitude’s Cabin Interiors division into one building and serves as the headquarters of the AIM Altitude group.
The opening ceremony was also attended by Mahmood Ameen and Nadir Bhola, senior vice president of engineering projects and manager of engineering projects at Emirates; Peer Wiebe, vice president of Airbus; members of the Chinese Embassy; Christopher Chope MP; Nick Geary, deputy mayor of Christchurch; and around 400 members of staff from AIM Altitude.
The factory encompasses new machinery, including an additional paint-and-bake booth, to bring the total to four painting booths, and a fully integrated preparation area, serving both paint and trim. The layout of the new shop floor is designed to facilitate process flow, with an open, flexible, main assembly area allowing product programs to be changed quickly if required. Key production leaders, production controllers and the quality team have also been integrated into production cells.
The whole facility has been built on lean principles, intended to shorten throughput times by reducing the distance parts travel in manufacturing, improving the line-side parts storage, shortening communications between departments and improving visual management of projects.
A customer experience area has also been introduced. The showcase area allows customers to see existing products in a dedicated space, and there is a demonstration area where customers can see their products as they develop.
January 5, 2017
