How shared learning between automotive and aerospace is shaping tomorrow’s manufacturing landscape

In an era where both the automotive and aerospace sectors are navigating serious challenges, including supply chain volatility and severe skills shortages, the ability to transfer engineering knowledge and process excellence across industries is more important than ever.

Working with both automotive and aerospace OEMs and suppliers at G&P, we see daily how the flow of innovation in one sector can transform another, helping unlock value for manufacturers and customers alike.

For decades, the automotive industry has set the bar in high-volume production, cost optimisation and process improvement. Automotive OEMs and suppliers have refined complex, scalable assembly lines and robust quality management systems into a well-oiled machine. In the past, aerospace firms prioritised ultra-low volumes, extreme tolerances and longer change cycles, but market forces have required a significant shake up.

Perhaps no concept better encapsulates automotive’s influence on aerospace and other industries than lean manufacturing. Once the mainstay of automotive engineering, lean principles now underpin much of the aerospace sector’s efficiency drive. From value stream mapping to just-in-time supply, the adoption of lean manufacturing has enabled aerospace manufacturers to streamline workstations, reduce waste and boost productivity many times over, resulting in faster output, fewer defects and ultimately greater cost efficiency.

Going the other way, high-level quality management techniques honed to meet aviation’s regulatory demands are now finding their place in automotive, particularly as the latter deals with the increased complexity of electrification and intense international competition.

Another shared growth area is digitalisation. Automotive manufacturers were quick to embrace connected factories and real-time data acquisition. Technologies such as digital twins and advanced analytics, once primarily associated with car manufacturing, are now revolutionising aerospace. These solutions enable the simulation of profile-critical components before a single part is cut, delivering precision while slashing development time.

Aerospace, in turn, has driven forward the application of technologies such as composite materials and additive manufacturing. When strategically deployed in automotive, these approaches are helping fuel lightweighting, especially crucial as electric vehicle technologies mature and gain popularity the world over.

Despite reticence from large global players, both sectors are still facing existential pressure to decarbonise. Here, the rapid progress automotive has made on battery systems, recycling and low-impact manufacturing is now guiding aerospace efforts to ‘green’ both engines and airframes, while aerospace-grade materials and components originally developed for aircraft are making their way into next-generation vehicles.

With automotive and aerospace supply chains renowned for complexity, speed and scale, supplier management presents a major cross-sector challenge. A recent report from KPMG highlights supply chain resilience as a key priority for aerospace manufacturers, and in a recent survey of global CEOs, 44% of respondents cited supply chains as the greatest threat facing industrial manufacturing.

Rigorous supplier auditing, process assurance and containment measures were all pioneered in the auto industry and are now standard practice in aerospace programmes seeking faster ramp-up and product launches.

Innovation has no borders, and the most agile organisations are now recognising that sharing knowledge and skills between the automotive and aerospace industries drives up standards for all. Crucially, the benefits of knowledge and skills transfer aren’t limited to these two sectors. Learnings from aerospace can heavily influence technological and process developments in the defence sector, and vice versa.

By drawing upon each industry’s strengths and encouraging a flexible, open-minded approach to engineering challenges, the automotive, aerospace and defence industries have the unique opportunity to accelerate progress toward a stronger, resilient and more sustainable future, together.

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Content published by Professional Engineering does not necessarily represent the views of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers.