Safran is a high-technology group focused on aerospace, defence and security. It comprises about 15 main companies, organised in four business branches: aerospace propulsion, aircraft equipment, defence & security and communications. Operating in more than 30 countries worldwide, Safran has 57,000 employees. It generated sales of e12 billion in 2007, including 24 per cent in the defence and security markets. Safran is a highly export-oriented group, with export sales accounting for more than 95 per cent of the total in civil aviation and 57 per cent in defence (average from 2001 to 2006).

Safran’s defence business, while relatively modest in volume, is nonetheless essential for several different reasons. First, for the country, since Safran supports France’s sovereignty and independence by contributing its advanced technologies, especially in propulsion, navigation and infrared imaging. These technologies can be found in a broad array of major national defence programmes, giving the country clear strategic and tactical advantages. Secondly, it is essential for Safran itself, since the defence business enables technological breakthroughs that give it a competitive edge—sometimes a decisive one—in civil markets. In return, the business volumes in civil markets finance investments and fixed expenses, and thus help ensure the long-term viability of the key competencies and industrial facilities needed to compete in the defence sector. This strategic dual expertise applies to most technologies and products within the Safran group.

Dual Expertise, Strategic Leverage

Dual expertise is often simply understood as a company’s application of technologies developed for military use to its civil products. But this is a rather reductive view of a more complicated process, one that it is worth examining in depth.