By Chuck Crumbo
ccrumbo@scbiznews.com
Published Nov. 28, 2011

South Carolina's growing aerospace industry, the availability of a skilled workforce and local training programs helped sway GKN Aerospace's decision to locate an assembly plant in Orangeburg County, a senior executive said.

GKN Aerospace announced Nov. 22 plans to invest $38 million and create 278 jobs over the next six years at its new Orangeburg facility. (Photo/Provided)

The England-based company announced Nov. 22 plans to invest $38 million and create 278 jobs over the next six years at its new Orangeburg facility. The facility will focus on making composite, light-weight bonded fuselages for the new HondaJet, a light business-class passenger plane.

South Carolina is one of four states in the southeastern United States that GKN considered for the new plant, said Mike McCann, senior vice president of business development and strategy, in an interview with the Columbia Regional Business Report. Other states in the running were North Carolina, Georgia and Florida.

GKN’s decision to locate in South Carolina included incentive packages offered by the county and state, and the advantage of being able to move into a 151,000-square-foot spec building in the Orangeburg County/City Industrial Park at U.S. Highway 301 and Interstate 26.

Being near the HondaJet plant in Greensboro, N.C., and moving into a building large enough to house the assembly operation factored in the company’s announcement, McCann said.

“At the same time we wanted to be in a place where we had the right skill sets for it,” McCann said. “We want to draw from within the existing skills of the people as well as training programs for future growth.”

GKN will be looking to hire people with skills generally required for aviation maintenance and automotive assembly, McCann said.

A review of the workforce demographics in the area showed a number of workers possess the desired skills, McCann said. McCann added that the presence of Air Force bases in Sumter and Charleston also would be a plus in finding workers.

“There’s some value to being close to a workforce that does maintenance on aircraft whether it’s civilian or military,” McCann said. “That’s a skill set that we have had real success at other locations, in the past, leveraging.”

McCann also cited the value of aviation training programs in the tech and public schools, as well as the state-run ReadySC program.

ReadySC, he noted, helps screen and train prospective employees, and also features internal training programs.

“The differentiator for South Carolina is the success they have demonstrated in establishing an integrated training program for pre-employment through functional operation,” McCann said.

GKN did not announce a projected annual payroll or average wage for the Orangeburg facility, but McCann said the company intends to be “competitive in the marketplace.”

The average wage in the area is $15 an hour, said Gregg Robinson, executive director of the Orangeburg County Economic Development Commission. Robinson said he expects some of the jobs that require advanced skills will pay higher than the average wage.

The incentive package, both long-term and short-term, also impressed GKN, McCann said.

The Coordinating Council for Economic Development approved the company for a rural infrastructure grant of $2 million and the county and city are adding $3.2 million for the purchase of the spec building, which is owned by Miller-Valentine Group, of Columbia. The deal calls for GKN to buy the building from the public agencies.

McCann said the move has been in the works for about a year. GKN has a facility in Alabama, which makes the composite panels for the HondaJet fuselage, but there wasn’t enough room there to expand.

Assembling the fuselage panels requires a large amount of space, McCann said. He added that the Orangeburg site includes 22 acres, so there’s room to grow.

Although GKN has a number of aerospace customers, including Boeing, which has an assembly plant for the 787 Dreamliner in North Charleston, the Orangeburg facility’s focus is solely on HondaJet, McCann said.

“We’re hopeful we can grow the business there as we have at our other locales, but that will come with time,” McCann said. “We do a lot of work for Boeing, but that’s not part of our plan right now.”

The new GKN facility will be upfitted and ready for occupancy around the second half of 2012. GKN will begin recruiting staff in the spring of 2012, and about 75 people are expected to be working in the facility within the first year of production. Employment is expected to climb to nearly 300 workers by the end of 2017.