On 9 Oct, ST Engineering opened its fourth aircraft‑maintenance facility in Singapore. The S$170 million, 84,000 sq m site houses four wide‑body bays and will eventually employ more than 500 staff when fully operational.

The new hub adds about 40 % capacity to ST Engineering’s wide‑body MRO network, allowing roughly 100 additional wide‑body aircraft to be serviced each year, giving airlines more flexibility as fleets grow.

Drones now perform visual checks, AI models spot corrosion and dents, and a robotic‑arm camera inspects landing gear, cutting inspection time by up to 83 %.

Humanoid robots fetch required items and hand them to autonomous mobile robots; larger guided vehicles move loads up to 500 kg, freeing an estimated 7,800 man‑hours per year.

Airlines can order 3D‑printed components directly from ST Engineering, shortening lead times, while an AI‑driven monitoring platform tracks maintenance progress in real time, replacing paper‑based logs.

Deputy Prime Minister Gan Kim Yong said the timing matches rapid air‑traffic growth in the Asia‑Pacific and that the facility will create jobs across the local aerospace ecosystem.

ST Engineering aims to raise overall productivity by 25 % and plans to roll out the same technology suite to other plants worldwide within one to two years, turning the hub into a global testbed.