Significant scale of investment is being put into one of Portsmouth’s biggest employers.
Airbus Defence and Space is ploughing a high single-digit million figure into its site in Anchorage Park. The firm said the aim is to increase operational efficiency, enhance its competitiveness, and make upgrades to its offices and customer areas.
The investment will bring Portsmouth’s space technology design and manufacturing work into one location, close to the main satellite assembly area. This will make it quicker and easier to move sensitive parts during production. A new visitor area will be created, fleshed out with modern conferencing facilities. This is part of a ‘comprehensive programme’ of upgrading facilities to improve the day-to-day working environment for its nearly 900 employees.
Airbus is one of Portsmouth biggest employers.
Gary O’Donnell, head of space systems UK, said:
“Airbus is consistently investing in the UK and across Europe, developing our Defence and Space capabilities, for sovereign and commercial activities. This latest announcement reinforces our long-term commitment to the UK, delivering better value to our customers through improved efficiencies and ensuring our teams can deliver our spacecraft from world-class facilities.”
Airbus’ Portsmouth site is already host to Space South Central, the largest regional space cluster in the UK. The site is also a significant site in the European landscape delivering Telecoms Payloads and Digital Processors across the Airbus space portfolio. It is the centre of Military Satellite Communications in the UK with a large cleanroom complex. The site at Portsmouth also includes the UK’s only space-certified satellite processor factory, specialising in producing radiation-hardened advanced digital processors, ensuring robustness and reliability in even the most challenging environments, including the Airbus-designed reconfigurable Hyperion Processor.
