The Incheon Creative Economy Innovation Center has been opened on July 22.
Incheon-based Hanjin Group will join hands with small enterprises within the area and create new business opportunities in the logistics and aerospace maintenance business. Korean Airline, a passenger air carrier unit of Hanjin Group, will lead the new business creation effort for local companies in Incheon whose economy has slumped for years.
A Korean Air official said, "The aircraft MRO [maintenance, repair, and overhaul] business is quite difficult for small firms to enter due to high entry barriers, but it offers a lot of opportunities to move into several related areas once you get in. Korean Airlines will do everything it can to transfer technology related to aircraft MRO to small companies so that they can come up with their own success items."
Aircraft MRO is an intensely quality-oriented business. It takes so much time to nurture skilled repair workers and is disadvantageous for those firms trying to exploit economies of scale. The specialized firms must also comply with highly strict international aviation quality standards for facility, equipment, parts, and workforce.
In order to meet these standards, Korean Air will provide know-how in complying with standards of the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration and the European Aviation Safety Agency. It will also build a new engine pilot operation center within the Incheon Free Economic Zone to allow partner firms to use freely for their engine MRO business.
To this end, Korean Air established IAT, a 90:10 joint venture with United Technologies International Corp.-Asia Private Ltd. (an affiliate of Pratt & Whitney) early in 2011. IAT will build the world's largest engine pilot operation center in a 69,000-square-meter site capable of testing engines whose thrust is up to 150,000 pounds.
