Farnborough 2022: Italy eyes role as main MRO and assembly hub for European F-35 operators
Italian Air Force F-35As participating in the NATO air policing mission in Iceland. (Credit: NATO).
Demand for F-35s in Europe has sky-rocketed in recent months alongside a growing desire of customers to fast-track their delivery time and have the aircraft built on the continent - but with only one European assembly line, how can Lockheed Martin meet these expectations?
During a press conference held during the 2022 ILA Berlin Air Show on 22-26 June, Lockheed Martin’s head of strategy and development for the F-35 programme, J.R. McDonald, claimed that the US government ‘is now more open to requests from European countries to have their F-35s produced at the Italian Final Assembly and Check-Out [FACO] facility in Cameri’.
Also at ILA, Col Luca Vitaliti, head of the F-35 Management, Sustainment and Integration Office in the Italian Air Force, concurred that European F-35 operators, ‘in exchange for minor flexibility to meet Lockheed’s available production capacity, could choose the Cameri FACO
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