Right after the Montreal Session, the Part-Time #11 cohort of the TBS Aerospace MBA program took off to join the Delegates from IIMB-TBS Aerospace MBA Batch 2 in Seattle in the frame of the curriculum. Prof. S Raghunath and Madan Mohan Raj (IIMB) and Dr. Christophe Bénaroya attended this international seminar entirely organized by the TBS Aerospace MBA team, and especially Marie Baudoin.
This seminar is definitely a wonderful opportunity to reinforce the relationships between the cohorts. The Aerospace MBA community first has had eye-opening conferences at University of Washington by Michel Merluzeau (Director, Aerospace Market Analysis | AirInsightResearch) and by Dietmar Klauber (Liebherr Aerospace / General Manager Liebherr-Aerospace US). On Day 2, the cohort has enjoyed a fantastic well-organized, very complete and much insightful visit of Boeing in Everett, including the visit of the amazing Dreamliner Gallery and a VIP visit of the world largest building, the Final Assembly Line for 747s, 767s, 777s, and 787s. Top-level managers such as Paul Lewis, Kourosh Hadi, Dennis Eng or TBS Aerospace MBA Alumni Michael Delanney have been deeply involved in this insightful experience. We all express our gratitude to Boeing team! We’d like to take this opportunity to express our sincere appreciation to Gaia Brown for her exceptional and continuous support to our program.
Day 3 was focused on two visits of leading suppliers of Boeing: ZodiacAerospace and Safran. While ZodiacAerospace offered an extensive session on their activities, on the market trends with diverse speakers including the top managers, Safran visit mainly focused on the landing gears and the related technical details. Both visits were very appreciated by the entire delegation. Thanks a lot to the teams involved:
- ZodiacAerospace: Trystan Parry, Laurent Debuire, Benoît Porte…
- Safran: Jean-Michel Hillion and Stéphane Machut….
Our special thanks go to Alinh Hoang for his continuous, friendly and effective support.
Day 4 enabled the delegation to visit two competitive companies designing, manufacturing and selling tooling for aerospace activities: MTorres America and ElectroImpact. Two companies working on a similar segment with two very different approaches in terms of strategy, organization, and mindset. What a valuable experience in terms of leadership and management! Our acknowledgment to the teams who warmly welcomed us:
- MTorres America: Javier Raya, Pierre-Yves Clech…
- ElectroImpact: Ben Hempstead (have a look at this short TED presentation in order to grasp the mindset of the organization)
We’d like to express our gratitude to the Department of Commerce, State of Washington (Simon Riou, Aline Allonas, John Thornquist, Allison Clark) for their support. We’d like to thank the French-American Chamber of Commerce and especially Jack Cowan we met during this session in Seattle.
Day 5: back to school! The Aerospace MBA delegation (PT11 & IIMB-TBS part-time program) enjoyed two presentations from:
- John Thornquist (Director of the Department of Commerce, State of Washington)
- Bruno Ferrand (CEO Latecoere International)
These two engaging conferences made it possible to go further regarding the business opportunities in the USA for aerospace players and the lessons learned in terms of business practices.
Thanks to all of you for the very fruitful & pleasant trip!
