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www.HartfordBusiness.com October 26, 2015 • Hartford Business Journal 3 By Gregory Seay gseay@HartfordBusiness.com W hatever their operating-overhead bur- dens, Connecticut's aerospace suppli- ers are a "very, very good'' source of components to one of the world's leading mak- ers of jetliners, which welcomes buying more from a state that is its single largest U.S. suppli- er base, a top Airbus Americas executive says. "We are always looking for good U.S. sup- pliers,'' said Barry Eccleston, president of the North and South American and Caribbean arm of Airbus SAS. More than five dozen Connecticut makers of aeroparts and systems, such as jet engines, composite-cockpit components, auxiliary-pow- er generators and aircraft landing gear, drew about $6.5 billion in 2014 from Airbus for their products and services, up from $5.7 billion in 2013, Eccleston said. That same year, Blagnac, France-based Airbus spent $16.5 billion with all of its U.S. suppliers. In 2009, not long before Airbus successful- ly tested Pratt & Whitney's new fuel-efficient PurePower geared turbofan jet engine aboard its new A320neo aircraft line, Airbus spent just $3.2 billion with Connecticut suppliers, he said. Today, Pratt's Middletown plant assem- bles engines (V2500, GP7200 and PurePower geared turbofan) for three different Airbus fleets including the A320, A380 and A320neo. The value of Pratt's aerospace relation- ship with Airbus was evident Oct. 16, as Eccleston was invited to keynote the 90th birthday celebration for Pratt at the Con- necticut Convention Center. Before the event, Eccleston talked about the importance of its relationship with Pratt and its United Technologies Corp. affiliate, United Technologies Aerospace Systems (UTAS), formerly Hamilton Sunstrand. Eccleston declined to comment about the rancor among Connecticut's business com- munity about what they say is the overburden of state taxes and regulation, high labor and energy costs and general uneasiness that the state is unfriendly to business. Indeed, Connecticut ranked 33rd in a recent report measuring states' attractiveness for aerospace manufacturing. Connecticut ranked dead last out of 50 states in operating costs and placed 32nd in overall tax burden in the "2015 Aerospace Man- ufacturing Attractiveness Rankings" produced by accounting and consulting firm Pricewater- houseCoopers (PwC). The state fared better with its industry size and education rank com- ing in 19th and 14th, respectively. Referencing Airbus' annual Connecticut procurement totals, Eccleston, a former Glastonbury resident, said it should be clear that Airbus has no problem with the pricing of products and services that it gets from its Nutmeg State supply chain. Its Connecticut-sourced aerospace Continued www.kelsercorp.com 111 Roberts St, Suite D East Hartford, CT 06108 860 610 2200 24/7/365 - hackers are incentivized to adapt tactics and attack persistently. How secure is your network? www.kelsercorp.com/cybercrime P H O T O S | C O N T R I B U T E D CT's high costs no burden to its Airbus relationship Barry Eccleston, president of Airbus Americas, once headed an East Hartford jet-engine consortium between Pratt & Whitney Co., Britain's Roll Royce PLC and others.