LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) — Dassault Falcon Jet will add $60 million in facilities at its Little Rock completion center, where it will perform finishing work on a new jet it plans to introduce, the company announced Wednesday.
The move preserves 400 high-paying jobs in Little Rock and will create new positions, Arkansas Economic Development Director Grant Tennille said. The company said the volume of new jobs depends on demand for aircraft three years from now, when the new operation is to come on line.
“Obviously it will mean additional head count. We just don’t know what the aircraft market will be like in 2016,” Dassault spokesman Andrew Ponzoni said. The plant has nearly 2,000 employees.
The company said the new aircraft has the “code name” of SMS, but officials didn’t describe its features.
Executives from Dassault headquarters in France and Arkansas officials, joined by French Ambassador Francois Delattre, gathered in an open hangar at the company’s facility at Little Rock’s airport Wednesday to announce the 250,000-square-foot expansion. A number of work spaces also will be upgraded and the plant will have 1.25 million square feet once the expansion is complete.
Dassault President and CEO John Rosanvallon said the Little Rock workforce has supported the plant well over its 38-year history.
“It was only normal that we expand our presence here,” Rosanvallon said. He added that once the new line is ready, “we’ll work for another three decades in Little Rock.”
But Tennille said the process wasn’t that simple.
“This was a competitive situation and there were other states very aggressively trying to get Dassault to build this new operation elsewhere,” Tennille said. “If that had happened, it would have resulted in the immediate loss of 400 jobs from here.”
City and state officials offered Dassault a batch of financial incentives.
Because 400 jobs were in the balance, Dassault qualified for a rebate equal to 3.9 percent of payroll for 10 years for those workers, Tennille said.
Gov. Mike Beebe approved $2 million from the Governor’s Quick Action Closing Fund to go toward renovations and new construction, and Dassault is also eligible for a sales tax refund on building materials, machinery and related equipment.
The city airport commission agreed to give Dassault rent credits over 40 years that will be worth $43 million, said Shane Carter, spokesman for Bill and Hilary Clinton National Airport.
Dassault’s jets are manufactured in France and flown to Little Rock, where workers fabricate cabinetry, upholstery and other items to customize the aircraft for buyers.
During a tour of the plant, walking by a jet with Chinese characters on the side, Ponzoni noted that China has become Dassault’s biggest buyer. The company sold its first jet in that country in 2006.
Dassault delivered 66 Falcon jets in 2012, and Ponzoni said it has a backlog of 25 to 30 jets for China alone, where the company has opened a subsidiary devoted to sales. Dassault has U.S. customers but also sells planes to customers in Brazil, India, Russia and other countries, he said.
The recession hit the private aircraft industry hard. Last year, Hawker Beechcraft announced the closure of its operation in Little Rock and made other cuts across the Wichita, Kan.-based company as it worked to emerge from bankruptcy.
The aircraft sector is an important part of Arkansas’ economy, employing more than 10,000 people. Aircraft and related products comprise the state’s largest export category, ahead of chicken, rice and munitions.
