Alas, the Andalucía Aerospace tribune is a space created to help give visibility to the companies in our cluster and their capabilities..
Titania is a materials testing laboratory for the aerospace sector.
In our facilities in El Puerto de Santa María we concentrate many testing techniques to characterise the main families of materials. In addition, we also have pilot scale manufacturing processes.
This combination of technologies is unique and allows us to tackle increasingly complex test plans.
We are now in our 15th year since we emerged as a spin-off of theUCA. Initially, all our attention was focused on the quality of testing, with a fundamental technical focus.
Over the years, we have had to work on professionalising the management of the company, reorganising, transforming ourselves digitally and commercially in order to be able to take leaps such as internationalisation and diversification of services and sectors.
There is a bit of everything, there is no doubt that there have been very important measures, implemented quickly, such as ERTE, ICO loans, etc., which have made it possible to stop the blow, protecting employment and companies, and which have counted on the responsibility of employers.
Now come the economic recovery funds, which are taking more time and for which more detail on how they will be articulated is yet to be provided. The opportunity is unique and should help us move towards new technologies and production models. It is everyone’s responsibility to make the best possible use of them.
On the other hand, we have the particularity that the Andalusian aeronautical sector has a strategic plan, defined before the pandemic, and in my opinion even more useful now, as it details lines of action and specific actions for the development of our industry. This plan needs funds to be able to implement actions, and it would be very important to be able to count on them as soon as possible.
It had less to do with what we do than with team management and uncertainty. Priority was given from the outset to protecting staff, minimising their presence on the premises, but at the same time trying to meet customer deliveries.
It is difficult to fit everything in, at the same time as many of the orders disappeared overnight.
In Andalusia there is a robust network that covers many technical competencies and has its maximum exponent in the FAL.
From Titania we see, through the test plans that we are asked for, that Andalusian companies compete hard and enter into new programmes, technologies, markets and even emerging businesses. In short, they try to go beyond supporting Airbus plants at regional level.
That said, there also needs to be a balance between what is being worked on in the global market and what is being brought in from Airbus at the regional level.
We need, therefore, that Airbus continues betting on the region, and that is why the possible closure of the Puerto Real plant is such bad news. Firstly because of the loss of industrial fabric that this means and secondly because it somehow “disconnects” us from the commercial division of Airbus. We ourselves would certainly not have taken the step from being researchers to entrepreneurs if plants like the one in Puerto Real had not existed in our environment.
At the time, we decided to set up in Tecnobahía, where the Airbus CBC plant was already located and where other companies in the sector were also present.
The relationship with the CBC has been very important because the factory has different manufacturing technologies and at the same time they have been committed over the years to innovation. This has allowed us to work on projects that have been strategic for both companies.
In El Puerto we have successful collaborations with Education Centres which have been the breeding ground for many of the professionals who are part of the company today.
Our commitment to El Puerto is also being renewed this year, as we have acquired a 6,000 m2 plot of land in TecnoBahía where we are starting the construction of a new 2,000 m2 building, where we will house new laboratories. This will involve an investment of €1 million and the creation of a significant number of new jobs, which will undoubtedly benefit the local population.
The pandemic is marking a turning point for the decision-making required by the climate crisis. There is consensus on the need and urgency for the decarbonisation of industry, and we now see dates and targets set by Airbus itself.
We share this vision, and being a major challenge, there will be no other way than to implement major research and innovation programmes where we are sure we can contribute our small grain of sand.
In this sense, at Titania we are opening new lines of work to study the feasibility of applying renewable energies in industrial processes that require a high energy demand.
One of the lines we are already working on is oriented towards the development and characterisation of new electrocatalysts and their use in electrolysers for the generation of green hydrogen, using exclusively renewable energies.
We have experienced it as a very important recognition that has infected us with joy and, above all, with pride, as we feel that in some way we are being recognised for our commitment to a form of management in which respect for our suppliers and employees has taken precedence over the temptation to tackle uncontrolled growth.
Our development has been based on both, employees and suppliers, and after 15 years full of small steps, the result has been the recognition of our own colleagues in the cluster.
Titania’s mission for the sector is to provide technical information on the materials used by the industry, information that we obtain from our laboratories.
In the coming years and from the aerospace sector in Andalusia, our challenge will be to continue providing information and knowledge in Materials Science, which will facilitate the use of renewable energies in the various strategies to reduce the carbon footprint.
Fernando Serrano
Business Development Manager ofTitania
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Alas, the Andalucía Aerospace tribune is a space created to help give visibility to the companies in our cluster and their capabilities. If you would like to participate in this space, please contact us by email at comunicacion@andaluciaaerospace.com
