As It Wins Federal Contracts, Sikorsky Relies on Smaller CT Suppliers Even More

Whether at airfields, on ships, in hangars or in the air, at any point in time there are 84 million components or more on the U.S. military's fleet of Sikorsky Black Hawk helicopters, not including any number more in other countries.

For Justin Wolfanger the only number that counts is one — the part that could be at risk of failure during flight. His Triumph Group is among an army of suppliers trusted by Stratford-based Sikorsky to bring those odds as close to zero as humanly possible.

With some 700 employees in West Hartford and Windsor, Triumph is among Sikorsky's largest Connecticut-based suppliers. At a Connecticut Business & Industry Association manufacturing conference on Thursday, Wolfanger said Sikorsky relies in turn on far smaller companies to produce some of those 40,000-plus parts that go onto every helicopter.

With more than 2,100 Black Hawks in Army use today — Sikorsky has produced more than 5,000 in its history — it is a staggering amount of upkeep for those helicopters. And with the constant need for fresh parts or systems as Sikorsky modernizes helicopters under a new Department of Defense contract, that is creating ample work for "Team Black Hawk" as the company dubs its suppliers according to Audrey Brady, vice president of operations for Sikorsky.

"If one part [fails] it means that aircraft won't fly," Wolfanger said. "And that one part could come from a machine shop that's family-owned in Wisconsin ... [or] Connecticut."

As Sikorsky reveled this week in a $10 billion-plus contract to build more heavy cargo and troop carrier helicopters for the U.S. Marine Corps and another to upgrade existing Black Hawks, it is finalizing details on a contract to build nearly 100 new Black Hawks over four years.

"The Black Hawk is going to be around for a very, very long time," Brady said Thursday during the CBIA conference in Southington. "The Black Hawk of today will not be the Black Hawk of tomorrow."

It takes people to manufacture those parts, or assemble them into the systems and aircraft that make up the Black Hawk today. Brian Montanari, CEO of Habco Industries in Glastonbury, noted the hiring needs for smaller suppliers — which in Connecticut might be competing head-to-head with Sikorsky itself for young workers; RTX and subsidiaries Pratt & Whitney and Collins Aerospace; or other better-known employers.

As of September, Sikorsky had more than 7,000 employees in Stratford, Bridgeport, Shelton and Trumbull, among 10,000 in all including at locations in Florida and Alabama.

"We can't compete on compensation — it's just not something we can do," Montanari said. "We're trying to focus on how do we grow the business without having to scale the personnel at the same rate, because it's just a zero sum game."

Montanari said a big part of that is cross-training Habco employees for multiple roles in the company so that it can operate at close to full operating efficiency.

Whether for employees heading out at the end of a shift from Sikorsky or any of its suppliers in Connecticut or beyond, Montanari said the thrill never leaves him when an aircraft passes overhead, and knowing he played a small part in helping it get back onto the ground.

"It's kind of neat for us to be a very small company located in Connecticut, and you can look up at the sky and very rarely ever see any aircraft — fixed wing or rotary, commercial or military — that we don't touch in some manner," said Brian Montanari, CEO of Habco Industries in Glastonbury. "It's really exciting."

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