Flying powerful towards the future with Embraer
We started early on Monday morning due to the two hour drive to our first company visit for our second week, Embraer in Sao José dos Campos in the state of Sao Paulo. Thanks to our excellent bus drivers we arrived too early but we were warmly welcomed by Luana and Fernando. We started with some coffee and chocolate and thereafter they showed us the historical center where they have an exhibition about the history of Embraer. We learned that the first man to fly, according to the Brazilians, is Alberto Santos-Dumont so the tradition of aircrafts is well established in the country. The Brazilian government supported the start up of Embraer, they realized that it is possible to turn technology and science into an industrial company. Bandeirante was their first aircraft and had its premier flight in 1969. This was an aircraft for the defense market and since Embraer was controlled by the government at this moment they were only allowed to sell to the Brazilian air force. To open up for other markets they introduced aircrafts for both commercial and executive sectors.
After the visit Fernando had a presentation about Embraer and we were introduced to their different aircrafts and markets but also how Embraer works with technical development in several diverse areas, such as how to lower the fuel consumption and emissions, develop multifunctional structures as well as with new aluminum alloys and how to automate the processes in the production.
Jan-Erik Ståhl had a short presentation about the Swedish delegation and then we had two research presentations, Catarina Dudas talked about Simulation Based Innovization and Anna Malm gave a presentation about technology transfer.
Next topic on the agenda was the factory visit – what all of us were longing for. We went in to the buses and stopped at several different production hangars. I am used to the automotive industry and in comparison this was something completely different – they are actually using months as the unit when it comes to time. The production is of course very complex, we are talking about aircrafts, so they put a lot of attention to quality, security and in education of the staff.
To conclude our visit we had a delicious lunch with some of the friendly staff at Embraer, to whom we also had great conversations about projects at Embraer and possible future collaboration.
Over and out, Catarina Dudas
Bengt Lindberg KTH
Unfortunately Björn got seriously injured and we really miss the Diffner announcement. Take care of you Björn!! You have a special cleaver sense of humor that takes a microphone speeches to another level. No Bengt or no Kerstin is able to replace you.
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