RECARO is turning out to be an undisputed leader in the aircraft seats industry as they went on to bag contacts with all major airlines across the globe. With an eye toward 2025, RECARO’s CEO, Mark Hiller, spoke to the Aircraft Interiors team about the company’s remarkable journey, its continued focus on innovation, sustainability initiatives, expansion plans, and its growing presence in India. Read on to learn more!
Q- RECARO has bagged big contracts in 2024, including Iberia, Finnair, Air India, IndiGo, etc. How will you describe the year ‘2024’ in terms of business for RECARO seats?
Ans – After the pandemic aviation is on a massive growth path. RECARO has won significant awards from our customers for the economy, premium as well as business class. Our new product, R3 economy class long-range orders is highly successful with line fit and retrofit programs to be delivered this year. Furthermore, we have many new programs starting up in economy class and also premium business class. 2024 came along with double-digit growth and an enormous ramp-up at all our sites. Our global order book is € 2 bn strong and very good filling grade for the upcoming years – it is filling up much faster than in past years.
Q2 – With newer and next-gen aircraft orders piling up every month, your analysis on the upcoming year 2025 for RECARO?
Ans – We expect to grow double digits again. From a supply chain perspective, the market will become more stable in terms of recovery. The geo-political disruptions might continue to be a challenge.
As to the next-gen aircraft – our R3, long-range economy class seat launched with Iberia in November on the A321XLR – a very proud moment for RECARO.
Q – Passengers are becoming increasingly finicky when it comes to aircraft seats. What goes behind the scenes while designing/making newer and more advanced seats?
Ans – Passengers look for a travel experience full of comfort and features based on their personal needs, next to sustainable lightweight design solutions. Some examples:
- BYOD holder (integrated into tray table or backrest)
- 6-way headrest with our hidden champion feature “neck support
- larger IFE monitors with OLED technology
- storage possibilities
- connectivity – wireless charging, USB-C ports
- jetlag prevention – custom-tailored lighting solutions for well-being on your schedule to fight jetlag (presented in R Horizon – business class technology demonstrator)
- lightweight design is at the core of the RECARO design principles:
- with our youngest long-range economy class seating solution R3, we reduced the weight by approx. 1,5 kg compared to its predecessor while at the same time increasing the comfortR7 business class seating solution is the lightest business class seating solution on the market by approx.. 20 kg compared to our competitor’s
- usage of innovative lightweight materials
- further pushing boundaries to reduce weight while keeping up comfort level
Sustainable seating is currently being developed under the guiding principles of Reduce, Reuse, Repair, and Recycle. This can be seen through our innovations with the R Sphere economy class sustainability concept and several sustainability materials. After several years of research and innovation initiatives, we managed to bring several seat features with sustainable materials to market like a PVC recycled cable plate and a real wood inlay for the endbay, which are already available options for some seat types.
Furthermore, our latest innovation is to integrate upcycled fishing nets instead of conventional netting into the lower literature pocket. These upcycled fishing nets are so-called “ghost nets”, that were captured from the ocean in an effort to reduce pollution and save the life of other sea animals like sea turtles or fishes.
Q– RECARO is the undisputed market leader when it comes to aircraft seats. Can you share some snippets of the journey since launch to becoming the leader?
Ans – RECARO follows a key strategic principle of “focus on what you do”. When a certain project has been turned into a success focus on the next substantial project.
- customer orientation and global footprint
- full product range in E/C for all relevant aircraft types
- most importantly to extend product portfolio in business class and invest in new seat generations
- keep innovating and gain new differentiation factors
Q– RECARO is planning to increase its sourcing from India after the huge seat orders from Indian airlines? Can you share some facts/figures regarding the sourcing/components that you are looking at?
Ans – RECARO is already sourcing in India with engineering capacity. And RECARO is continuously evaluating sourcing opportunities, yet decisions will be made based on the sourcing strategy next to offering some incremental benefits, like i. e. pricing, speed of delivery, etc.
RECARO has a global supply chain setup, with a strategy to also consider local sourcing.
Q- How has sustainability shaped the aircraft seat manufacturing at RECARO?
Sustainability at RECARO embraces:
- ecological responsibility
- social engagement
- economic success
With our products, the key topic is lightweight design, since weight is of the essence for airlines. RECARO is known for its lightweight design solutions, 15 years ago our innovation team was tasked to develop the lightest E/C seat – the concept seat “Stingray” was developed at a weight of approx. 5,6 kg. It used among other materials carbon.
S. Q3 with R Sphere
Furthermore, RECARO is also looking at recycling seats.
During the last years, all sites switched to paperless production by digitalizing all technical paper drawings relevant to our operation teams. Now each final assembly team member can access via “movable” screens the relevant drawing for the specific production step.
Q – How do you view the aircraft interior market trend as we step into 2025?
Ans – Very positive. Aviation is one of the industries with a highly positive outlook. Long-term forecast is predicting a doubling of aircraft within the next 20 years.
Q – Is the current supply chain issue impacting your business, if yes, how?
Ans – We are facing supply chain challenges, which we are able to manage, they just come with increased effort and at a higher cost. Our global footprint is clearly supporting our supply chain.
Q – Are any expansion plans going ahead?
Ans – RECARO as the global market leader for economy class seating solutions is on a growth path also with its business class seating solutions. In the last couple of years, RECARO has expanded its sites with its space2grow initiatives in Germany (crash facility & flam lab) and China.
