AgustaWestland was an Anglo-Italian

helicopter A helicopter is a type of rotorcraft in which Lift (force), lift and thrust are supplied by horizontally spinning Helicopter rotor, rotors. This allows the helicopter to VTOL, take off and land vertically, to hover (helicopter), hover, and ...

design and manufacturing company, which was a wholly owned subsidiary of

Finmeccanica Leonardo S.p.A., formerly Leonardo-Finmeccanica and originally Finmeccanica, is an Italian multinational company specialising in aerospace, defence and security. Headquartered in Rome, the company has 180 sites worldwide. It is the 12th largest ...

(now known as Leonardo). It was formed in July 2000 as an Anglo-Italian

multinational company A multinational corporation (MNC; also called a multinational enterprise (MNE), transnational enterprise (TNE), transnational corporation (TNC), international corporation, or stateless corporation, is a corporate organization that owns and cont ...

, when Finmeccanica and GKN merged their respective helicopter subsidiaries (

Agusta Agusta was an Italian helicopter manufacturer. It was based in Samarate, Northern Italy. The company was founded by Count Giovanni Agusta in 1923, who flew his first aeroplane in 1907. The MV Agusta motorcycle manufacturer began as an offshoot ...

and

Westland Helicopters Westland Helicopters was a British aircraft manufacturer. Originally Westland Aircraft, the company focused on helicopters after the Second World War. It was amalgamated with several other British firms in 1960 and 1961. In 2000, it merged ...

) to form AgustaWestland, with each holding a 50% share. Finmeccanica acquired GKN's stake in AgustaWestland in 2004. In 2016, AgustaWestland was merged into Leonardo S.p.A. (formerly Finmeccanica), where it became the company's helicopters division under the Leonardo Helicopters brand.

History

The collaboration between Agusta and Westland dates back to 1981, when the two companies established the European Helicopter Industries

joint venture A joint venture (JV) is a business entity created by two or more parties, generally characterized by shared ownership, shared returns and risks, and shared governance. Companies typically pursue joint ventures for one of four reasons: to acce ...

with the aim of developing a new medium-size

utility helicopter A utility helicopter is a multi-purpose helicopter capable of pursuing a wide array of tasks. They have proven useful in both civilian and military operations, with versatility being their defining trait. Civilian Helicopters play a crucial ...

, the EH101. In March 1999, Finmeccanica and GKN announced their intention to merge their respective helicopter subsidiaries. The two parties announced finalised terms for the merger in July 2000, which included a 50-50 ownership structure, and the payment of top-up fees to GKN to compensate for a disparity in profit levels between Agusta and Westland. In January 2002, AgustaWestland announced that it would be cutting a total of 950 jobs in the United Kingdom and closing its factory in

Weston-super-Mare Weston-super-Mare ( ) is a seaside town and civil parish in the North Somerset unitary district, in the county of Somerset, England. It lies by the Bristol Channel south-west of Bristol between Worlebury Hill and Bleadon Hill. Its population ...

, which carried out customer support work, as activity was concentrated at its main site in

Yeovil Yeovil () is a town and civil parishes in England, civil parish in Somerset, England. It is close to Somerset's southern border with Dorset, west of London, south of Bristol, west of Sherborne and east of Taunton. The population of the bui ...

. On 26 May 2004, GKN confirmed that it had agreed to sell its share of AgustaWestland to Finmeccanica for £1.06 billion. The sale was approved by the British government in October 2004. AgustaWestland opened offices in Philadelphia in 2005 and won a contract to build the new presidential helicopter

Marine One Marine One is the call sign of any United States Marine Corps aircraft carrying the president of the United States. As of 2024, it is most frequently applied to a presidential transport helicopter operated by Marine Helicopter Squadron One (HMX ...

over the U.S. manufacturer

Sikorsky Aircraft Sikorsky Aircraft is an American aircraft manufacturer based in Stratford, Connecticut. It was established by the Russian-American aviation pioneer Igor Sikorsky in 1923, and was among the first companies to manufacture helicopters for civilian ...

, but this program was cancelled in 2009. In November 2005, it was announced that AgustaWestland had agreed to acquire

Bell Helicopter Bell Textron Inc. is an American aerospace manufacturer headquartered in Fort Worth, Texas. A subsidiary of Textron, Bell manufactures military rotorcraft at facilities in Fort Worth, and Amarillo, Texas, United States as well as commercial heli ...

's 25 per cent interest in the AB139 medium twin helicopter program, and to increase its interest in the BA609 civil

tiltrotor A tiltrotor is an aircraft that generates lift (force), lift and thrust, propulsion by way of one or more powered Helicopter rotor, rotors (sometimes called ''proprotors'') mounted on rotating shaft (mechanical engineering), shafts or nacelles ...

aircraft from 25 per cent to 40 per cent. Qinetiq AgustaWestland AW105E Power arrives RIAT Fairford 10thJuly2014 arp

In June 2008, AgustaWestland and the Russia-based helicopter manufacturer

Russian Helicopters JSC Russian Helicopters () is a helicopter design and manufacturing company headquartered in Moscow, Russia. The company designs and manufactures civilian and military helicopters. The company's principal shareholder is Rostec. It is the world's ...

agreed to form a new joint venture company to assemble AW139 helicopters in Russia. Construction of a $50 million helicopter assembly facility in the town of Tomilino near Moscow began in June 2010. In early 2010, AgustaWestland acquired PZL-Świdnik, a Polish helicopter manufacturer. In September 2012, AgustaWestland and

Northrop Grumman Northrop Grumman Corporation is an American multinational Aerospace manufacturer, aerospace and Arms industry, defense company. With 97,000 employees and an annual revenue in excess of $40 billion, it is one of the world's largest Arms industry ...

announced the signing of a comprehensive teaming agreement under which the companies would jointly bid for contracts to build the U.S. Air Force Combat Rescue helicopter and U.S. Navy's new "Marine One" presidential helicopter. In March 2013, AgustaWestland announced its

Project Zero Project Zero is a team of security analysts employed by Google tasked with finding Zero-day (computing), zero-day vulnerabilities. It was announced on 15 July 2014. History After finding a number of flaws in software used by many end-users whi ...

hybrid tiltrotor/fan-in-wing technology demonstrator. The unmanned demonstrator made its first tethered flight in June 2011 at AgustaWestland's Cascina Costa, Italy facility. According to the company, the aircraft "employs no hydraulics, doesn't burn fossil fuel and generates zero emissions."

AgustaWestland AW101 order controversy

India signed a contract to purchase 12

AgustaWestland AW101 The AgustaWestland AW101 is a medium-lift helicopter in military and civil use. First flown in 1987, it was developed by a joint venture between Westland Helicopters in the United Kingdom and Agusta in Italy in response to national requiremen ...

helicopters in February 2010 for the Communication Squadron of

Indian Air Force The Indian Air Force (IAF) (ISO 15919, ISO: ) is the air force, air arm of the Indian Armed Forces. Its primary mission is to secure Indian airspace and to conduct aerial warfare during armed conflicts. It was officially established on 8 Octob ...

to carry the president, PM and other VVIPs. The contract was frozen in February 2013 after allegations surfaced that US$60 million had been paid as a bribe. On 12 February 2013, Giuseppe Orsi, the CEO of Finmeccanica, was arrested by Italian authorities; the following day Indian Defence Minister A.K. Antony ordered a probe into the contract. In January 2014, India cancelled the US$630 million deal, subsequently recovering the sum which it had paid.

Merger into Leonardo

In 2016, following a corporate reorganisation, AgustaWestland merged into Leonardo S.p.A., Finmeccanica's new name. With this reorganidation, AgustaWestland ceased to exist as a separate company, and it became Leonardo's helicopter division. In 2020 Leonardo relaunched the "Agusta" brand for the VIP helicopter sector. The launch of the new brand was announced during Expo 2020 in Dubai.

Products

References

External links