Benjamin Peter, edited by Thibault Nadal 10:14 p.m., February 23, 2022
Like countless sectors, the aeronautics field has been hard hit by the health crisis.
This is particularly the case with AAA, an Airbus subcontractor which had to part with more than 1,000 employees.
But today, the company is starting to rehire and above all wants to diversify its activity.
REPORT
Airbus subcontractors in the Toulouse region have been hard hit by the health crisis.
To relaunch, these companies are mobilizing in search of new outlets.
"When Airbus sees that the whole chain is fine".
So when everything stopped, the drop in activity was brutal for Serge Dumas, the boss of Gillis Aéronautique, an SME with 40 employees specializing in fasteners.
They have benefited from partial unemployment, from the recovery plan to invest and are now delighted that their main client is doing better.
>> Find Europe evening in replay and podcast here
"If there were no aeronautical leader, we wouldn't exist. The braking had to be brutal. Today, the recovery depends on the real industrial rhythms that the chain will bring us down ", he explains, before affirming and his employees and he are "ready for the ramp-up".
A desire to diversify business
If Gillis survived the crisis well, it was also because he had diversified considerably.
At AAA, which is a service provider, Airbus represented 70% of turnover before the Covid.
It was necessary to part with 800 temporary workers with nearly 300 employees.
Today, he is rehiring, but no longer wants to be so dependent, as explained by Bernard Vallée, from AAA.
"We have intensified our actions other than aeronautics. We have hired specific sales people for these areas. These axes represented 5% in 2019. There, in 2021, we ended our financial year with 11% diversification" , explains the commercial director.
And the objective of this subcontracting is that rail, naval or energy represent 25% of their turnover within three years.