Market Trends of Civil Aerospace Training And Simulation Industry
Full Flight Simulator (FFS) Segment Expected to Account for the Highest Market Share During the Forecast Period
The full flight simulator (FFS) segment dominated the market and is expected to continue in the coming years. The full flight simulator is generally equipped with a motion actuator that replicates flight movement, offering a real-life-like experience inside the simulator that will allow trainees in the aerospace and aviation industries to receive a complete training experience. With the lack of trained and experienced pilots, airlines and companies are working on pilot training programs, which increases the market for full-flight simulators. In August 2022, CAE Inc. announced that it had signed a 15-year contract with Qantas Group for the development and operation of a new pilot training center in Sydney. CAE will deploy a new A320 full-flight simulator and purchase B787, A330, and B737NG full-flight simulators from the Qantas Group. Currently, the new and advanced FFS is being integrated with new technologies, like virtual reality, to improve the efficiency of training pilots.
For instance, in April 2022, the Mexican Federal Civil Aviation Agency awarded certification to Aeromexico's second CAE 7000XR Boeing 737 MAX FFS. The airline acquired the simulator to cater to its training requirements as travel demand increased and its fleet grew. In May 2022, at the World Aviation Training Summit (WATS), CAE announced that it was expanding its Toronto Training Center for the purpose of deploying a CAE 7000XR Boeing 787 and a CAE 7000XR Boeing B737 MAX full-flight simulators (FFS). The president of CAE has said that this is to support Canadian airlines as international air travel is returning to normal levels after the COVID-19 pandemic.
Such developments in the market are likely to supplement the growth trajectory of the full flight simulator (FFS) segment over the forecast period.
Asia-Pacific is Anticipated to Register the Highest Growth During the Forecast Period
The increasing passenger traffic in the Asia-Pacific region is propelling the procurement of new aircraft by the airlines and aircraft operators in the region. Major airlines in the region, like China Eastern Airlines, China Southern Airlines, Air China, Indigo, Korean Air, and All Nippon Airways, have huge aircraft orders planned to be delivered during the forecast period. According to Boeing, there will be a demand for more than 244,000 new pilots in the Asia-Pacific region during the next two decades, with a demand for 126,000 pilots from China alone.
Accordingly, there have been significant developments concerning Civil Aviation Flight Training and Simulation in China. For instance, in April 2023, Boeing announced that they had brought its B737 MAX flight simulator to its Shanghai training center to fulfill the promise of improving pilot training for the aircraft in China after two fatal crashes in 2018 and 2019 led to it being grounded worldwide. Moreover, the United States plane maker has installed the B737 MAX Flight Training Device at its training hub at Shanghai Pudong International Airport to better support the operations of Chinese airlines. To increase the pilot training capacity in India, ALSIM was awarded a contract by the Airports Authority of India (AAI) in February 2021 to deliver three Flight Simulator Training Device (FSTD) simulators of EASA Flight Navigation and Procedure Trainer (FNPT) Multi Crew Coordination (MCC) level II types for single-aisle aircraft. All three FNPT II simulators are scheduled to enter service by 2022 at its training centers, namely, CATC Prayagraj, HTC Hyderabad, and NIATAM Gondia. Also, major countries in the region are accelerating their human space exploration programs. For instance, China is currently working to build its new space station, which is expected to be completed by 2022, and conducts deep-space human spaceflight by 2030. Such human space exploration plans are anticipated to propel the demand for space simulation and training solutions during the forecast period.
