Rolls-Royce and Turkish Airlines solidified their ongoing cooperation to support and grow Türkiye’s position in the global aerospace industry. Tufan Erginbilgic, CEO of Rolls-Royce, and Prof. Ahmet Bolat, chairman of the board and the executive committee of Turkish Airlines, signed a joint statement at a ceremony held at the Turkish Airlines headquarters in Istanbul. In attendance were the ministers of Industry & Technology, Trade, Transport & Infrastructure, and the deputy minister of National Defence. Also present were the representatives of top Turkish Aerospace companies as well as the British Consul General, and undersecretaries of France and Spain. They were joined by Guillaume Faury, CEO Airbus, Christian Scherer, Airbus commercial CEO, and Rob Watson, president Civil Aerospace, Rolls-Royce.
“Türkiye is a strategically important market for Rolls-Royce across our business,” said Tufan Erginbilgic, CEO, Rolls-Royce. “We are very pleased with the confidence that Turkish Airlines has placed in our Trent XWB engines. We now look forward to working with Turkish Airlines and our partners to use our extensive aerospace engineering experience to benefit the Turkish economy, grow the country’s skills base and expand its role in the energy transition. I am personally very energised by the strengthening relationship between our great company, Turkish Airlines and the Republic of Türkiye.”
The joint statement follows the historic Turkish Airlines order for 80 Airbus A350 aircraft. That deal makes Turkish Airlines the world’s largest operator of the Trent XWB, which powers the Airbus A350, and included an order for 120 Trent XWB-84 engines and 40 Trent XWB-97 engines, excluding options and spares.