Aegean opened yesterday, in an "unofficial first," the doors of its new technical base and its simulator and crew training centre.  This is a €140m investment, which the company announced in early 2023 and completed within a year after carrying out an extensive reconstruction of the old Olympic hangar, abandoned for more than 10 years, and proceeding with an energy upgrade and panel installation, creating a 25km² photovoltaic park on the roof.

ADDED VALUE

"A green hangar hosting the maintenance services that Aegean performs both for its own needs and now for third parties, and a modern pilot and cabin crew training centre with 4 simulators, which will become 7 in its full development in the coming years," said Aegean CEO Dimitris Gerogiannis.   An investment, he continued, "which not only upgrades our capabilities in the field of heavy maintenance of aircraft and crew training, but we believe it has added value for the country, as from the first day of operation we attract foreign airlines by providing heavy maintenance services on their aircraft and crew training on the centre's simulators.".

INVESTMENT IN HUMAN CAPITAL

Mr. Gerogiannis continued, "Along with the investment in the new training and maintenance facilities we are creating, there is a steady investment in human capital, which is at the heart of these investments." Thus, we already have more than 90 pilots in our cockpits from the first pilot scholarship programme launched in 2018, while next month the first 27 graduates from the corresponding engineering scholarship programme we are implementing from 2022 will graduate. In this way, we are creating a very good and effective mix of generations that coexist in our pilot corps and in our engineering corps, which guarantees continuity and consistency in both the quality of skills and the culture of Aegean."

AEGEAN ENGINEERS

Currently, the technical base alone employs around 400 employees (+20% from the corresponding technical staff on 1/1/2023 and +50% from the corresponding staff on 1/1/2019), with the aim of increasing by around +10% each year. It is worth noting that more than 50 graduates of Olympic Air's Engineering School are already working at the Technical Base, while in October the first 27 graduates from the Engineering Scholarship Program, which started in 2022, will start working.  This is a maintenance organisation that, at full deployment and over a five-year period, will employ around 600 to 700 people.

AEGEAN FLIGHT TRAINING CENTER

To date, 4 full-flight simulators have already been installed (in partnership with CAE, which undertook the construction, management, and maintenance of the systems), including two Airbus A320s, a Boeing 737NG, and an ATR 72-600, with space available for 3 additional full-flight simulators.  The simulators are currently operating on an almost 24/7 basis, training pilots from Aegean, Olympic Air and other airlines in challenging scenarios.  In fact, pilots have the possibility to carry out both the initial and the refresher training, which takes place every 6 months. The Aegean CAE training center, when fully developed, will be able to train up to 3,500 pilots (42,000 hours of pilot training) and support the training needs of even more cabin crew.