Farnborough 2022 concludes

The grand biennial aviation extravaganza in UK witnessed the participation of many countries, and sealing of many deals, thus setting a roadmap for the civil aviation industry for the next few years.

Post Covid-19, this was the first live Farnborough International Air Show. One of the two premier air shows in the world and second in terms of scale and size to the Paris show (with which it alternates) close to a hundred thousand visitors flocked to the airport in Hampshire over the week of July 18-22. Although it was now a five-day event- a decision taken back in 2019- and limiting public participation to the last day, Friday only, it was a booming show by all means. Scores of delegates from across the aerospace spectrum- both civil and military, were present for the 'in-person' networking that is the hallmark of these shows.

As expected, and as it happened at Eurosatory (the world's premier land defence show) just a month back in Paris, the war in Ukraine was on top of everyone's mind. The defence sector was omnipresent and overwhelming. If that was one side of the story, the other side was an innovation, collaboration and how to shorten time schedules both for creativity and production. War forces you to innovate and compress and that in short was the story for the defence segment at Farnborough.

For commercial aviation, sector attention was focused laser-like on rebuilding from the catastrophic lockdowns of years prior. Aerospace leaders are anxious to simply turn the page after the pandemic and the safety grounding of the B-737 MAX, events which rocked the industry. Supply chain problems, soaring inflation, fuel prices, and ever-growing pressure to decarbonise highlighted this edition.