Raytheon to create 50 new jobs at its Special Mission Aircraft facility in Broughton

Raytheon is re-investing and expanding its Special Mission Aircraft facility at its Broughton site on Deeside Enterprise Zone, which will become the HQ for the Airborne Solutions business.

The c.£1m investment, which is backed by Welsh Government business finance, will create a Centre of Excellence for design and programme management for UK and international customers, as well as R&D activities that will create  50 highly-skilled jobs;  

Raytheon Broughton has carried out build-standardisation programme’s on the RAF’s Sentinel R1 surveillance fleet, and the Hawker Beechcraft King Air 350CER-based Shadow R1 also used by the RAF

Richard Daniel, chief executive of Raytheon UK, said:

“The new office building, commencing next year, will reinvigorate the Broughton site and lead to it becoming the Centre of Excellence for design and programme management for domestic and international customers.

“Raytheon’s Broughton site will become the Head Office for the Airborne Solutions business and it is envisaged that the new project would create 50 jobs in Wales over 18 months, in programme and operational management, engineering and quality, logistics and commercial disciplines.

“Raytheon UK has leading expertise in aircraft modification for Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance roles and delivers pivotal operational capability to the RAF, through the Sentinel and Shadow fleets.

“The increase in capacity with the new facility enables Raytheon to address burgeoning international and adjacent markets with new customers, such as border control authorities and civil contingencies agencies.”

The jobs announcement comes on the eve of the UK Investment Summit Wales 2014 at the Celtic Manor Resort, Newport, the First Minister Carwyn Jones has announced a total of six new investment projects that are receiving Welsh Government support to create more than 1,100 new, high quality jobs for Wales.

Speaking ahead of the summit, the First Minister said:

“Inward investment to Wales is at record levels.  These six projects are creating a very significant number of new, high quality jobs for Wales.

“There’s nothing we can’t do in Wales and that’s what I’ll be telling international investors tomorrow. They won’t just have to take my word for it – today’s announcements are the latest in a steady stream of new and existing investors who continue to choose Wales.”  

The five other projects which along with Raytheon Broughton will create a total of more than 1,100 new jobs for Wales are:

• International business advisory firm Deloitte is set to create up to 700 jobs as it prepares to diversify and expand its business operations Centre of Excellence in the Central Cardiff Enterprise Zone;
• London-based Griffin Place Communications (GPC), a new contact centre outsourcer specialising in customer care and lead generation, is set to create more than 300 new jobs in the next 12 months at its new site in Cwmbran; 
• London-based Smartpipe Solutions is establishing a software development and research centre in Cwmbran in a Welsh-Government supported investment of over £10m that will create 44 highly skilled IT engineering jobs;
• SPTS Technologies, an Orbotech (NASDAQ:ORBK) Welsh anchor company, has been awarded a Welsh Government R&D grant towards a  three-year research project to develop advanced wafer processing solutions for high growth Advanced Packaging applications in the manufacture of the latest generation of integrated circuits and micro electro mechanical systems (MEMS). The project will create 30 full-time R&D roles at Newport;
• Global packaging firm Essentra, a FTSE 250 company, opens a new 52,000 sq ft purpose-built packaging manufacturing facility at Imperial Park in Newport tomorrow (Friday November 21), creating more than 20 new jobs.