Interview with Ulrich Geier, Member of the Executive Board, Business Unit Aerospace Electronics, Liebherr-Elektronik GmbH

Mr. Geier, please introduce yourself briefly.

My name is Ulrich Geier and I have been working at Liebherr for 12 years. Since June 2017, I have been a Member of the Executive Board of Liebherr-Elektronik GmbH at the Lindau location, and am Manager of the Aerospace Electronics business unit.

I am a qualified energy electronics engineer for plant technology and studied electrical engineering.

Why did Liebherr decide to create a new business unit Aerospace at Liebherr-Elektronik?

The main reason is the concentration of electronics expertise within our Aerospace and Transportation Systems Division in the Liebherr Group. We want to respond to the needs of our customers in a flexible and time-optimised manner. It would not make sense to scatter the electronics expertise across various locations in our division, as this would complicate communication and hinder dynamic responsiveness.

One of the advantages of having the aerospace business unit at the Lindau location is the direct proximity to Liebherr’s industrial electronics business unit which is also stationed there.

Both business units are perfectly complemented by the development and manufacturing expertise at the location in Lindau, without having to set up separate organisational units for cross-divisional topics. Furthermore, the aerospace electronics business unit benefits from the large-scale knowledge of Liebherr’s industrial electronics business unit and can therefore also feed cost-optimised approaches for design, testing and manufacturing into aerospace products.

What are the benefits of the restructuring for the customers?

Our customers benefit from significantly faster response times, a very clear communication structure and a concentration of electronics expertise at one location. The minimization of non-productive organizational units and the use of synergies between the business units at the Lindau location is ultimately reflected in lower development and manufacturing costs for the customers.

This is relevant across our entire portfolio of services such as technological and product development, testing house services, production of our own products, customer services as well as electronic manufacturing services.

Lindenberg and Lindau are two different locations. Where and who are the points of contact?

The point of contact for aerospace electronics is pooled via the marketing and sales organisation of the two OEM companies Liebherr-Aerospace in Toulouse and Liebherr-Aerospace in Lindenberg. Our colleagues there are in direct daily contact with the aerospace electronics business unit in Lindau.

During acquisition phases, development projects as well as production and service business, we are usually also in direct contact with the customers, however always under the umbrella of Liebherr’s aerospace programs.

What are the goals of the aerospace electronics business unit? What are the next steps?

We are currently working on several highly promising technological projects and platform products for the next generation of aircraft programs.

Together with Liebherr-Aerospace Lindenberg and Toulouse, we are developing system solutions for flight control, air management control, landing gear and stand-alone electronics products that will generate benefits for our customers in the form of an increase in quality, lightweight construction, energy efficiency and cost reductions. In addition to the increased customer benefits already mentioned, we are working towards supporting global climate goals with the new power electronics products. We regard the progressive electrification of typical aircraft systems as well as the support and replacement of conventional drive technology as our contribution to the “green aircraft” of the future.

For today’s aircraft programs, we offer continuously optimized products and service solutions, which help our customers to maintain the technical and commercial success of these aircraft in the market.

We are currently expanding our portfolio of EMS services and are also enabling our customers to manufacture third-party designs with our quality standards. And last but not least, we offer further testing and qualification services at our modern, fully-equipped test center for electronic modules.