Post date: Dec 21, 2012 9:27:16 PM
Source: AL.com by Kelli Dugan December 6, 2012
MOBILE, Alabama – Mobile welcomed officially its first Airbus-related supplier Thursday barely five months after the Toulouse-based planemaker selected the Port City to house its first North America final assembly plant. “Our hope and desire is to continue to grow with Mobile in its upward trajectory,” said Bruno Bernard, chief executive officer of Safran Engineering Services. Labinal – through its subsidiary Safran Engineering Services –will open a $2 million engineering facility at Mobile’s Brookley Aeroplex, Bernard announced formally from the Arthur Outlaw Convention Center in downtown Mobile.
Slated for completion in early 2013, Safran will eventually employ 50 engineers in Mobile with an expected starting annual salary of about $70,000. “This project was not without competition from other cities,...but there was no way I was going to let the first supplier go anywhere else,” Jones said. Mayor Sam Jones said a total of $106,000 in incentives were provided, including about $70,000 from the city of Mobile, $24,000 from Mobile County and $12,000 from the state. Any costs associated with training provided by the Alabama Industrial Development Training program are not part of that figure, he said. Bernard said – as an engineer – “thoughtful and deliberate” due diligence can only result in one decision when the spirit of cooperation and business-friendly climate is as prevalent as it is in Mobile.
Safran, he said, joins more than 30 international companies who now call Mobile home. “We’re becoming more international every day, and this is not the end of the train by any stretch of the imagination,” Hallett said. Meanwhile, David Trent, site director for the Airbus Engineering Center at Brookley, welcomed his new neighbor and Airbus’ soon-to-be on-site partner. “Airbus has been a proud resident of Mobile for over five years now, and we know that this is a welcoming city. You couldn’t have chosen a better home,” Trent said.
“We’ve had a long relationship with Safran Engineering, and we’re so pleased to have a good friend, a good colleague joining us in the neighborhood. I think we can expect to see a lot of growth,” Trent said. Congressman Jo Bonner said the pride associated with Safran’s arrival is almost inexpressible. “In choosing Mobile, in choosing south Alabama…you are investing in our future. We are investing in your future. And together, our future is extremely bright,” Bonner said.