 | |
| Company type | Subsidiary |
|---|---|
| Industry | Aerospace |
| Founded | 1946 (as Redifon) |
Key people | Alex Dorrian (CEO) [1] |
| Products | Full flight simulators |
| Services | Commercial aviation training, military training |
Number of employees | ~2,000 |
| Parent | Thales Group |
Thales Training & Simulation Ltd. is a multinational company which manufactures simulators, including full flight simulators and military simulators, and provides related training and support services. It is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Thales Group. [2]
The origins of the company date back to the incorporation of Redifon in the United Kingdom in 1946. [2] [3] In 1948, the company moved to the then new town of Crawley in West Sussex. In 1981, the parent company British Electric Traction changed the company name to Rediffusion Simulation Limited (RSL) to take advantage of the then familiar Rediffusion brand name.
In 1988, the company was bought by Hughes Aircraft and renamed Hughes Rediffusion Simulation (HRSL).
In 1994, the company was taken over by Thomson-CSF, who merged it with Link Miles (acquired by Thomson-CSF in 1990) and renamed the company Thomson Training & Simulation (TTSL). The merged companies were based at the Manor Royal site at Crawley.
In 1998, the simulation business of Wormald Technology of Australia was bought and renamed Thales Training & Simulation Pty Ltd (TTSP).
In the United States, Burtek, bought in 1979 by Thomson-CSF, was renamed Thomson Training & Simulation Inc.
At the end of 2000, the company was renamed Thales Training & Simulation (TTS) when the parent company re-branded using the Thales name.
Thales sold its civilian fixed-wing simulation business to L-3 Link Simulation & Training UK in August 2012. [3] [4] The purchase included part of the TTS Crawley plant, but not Thales' military rotary-wing (helicopter) simulation business. [5]
Thales Training & Simulation has four main manufacturing plants:
In addition, the company has joint ventures and/or customer support hubs in the United States, Saudi Arabia, China, etc.[ citation needed ]
Thales have built and now operate numerous types of aircraft simulators, including:
A flight simulator is a device that artificially re-creates aircraft flight and the environment in which it flies, for pilot training, design, or other purposes. It includes replicating the equations that govern how aircraft fly, how they react to applications of flight controls, the effects of other aircraft systems, and how the aircraft reacts to external factors such as air density, turbulence, wind shear, cloud, precipitation, etc. Flight simulation is used for a variety of reasons, including flight training, the design and development of the aircraft itself, and research into aircraft characteristics and control handling qualities.
L3 Technologies, formerly L-3 Communications Holdings, was an American company that supplied command and control, communications, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (C3ISR) systems and products, avionics, ocean products, training devices and services, instrumentation, aerospace, and navigation products. Its customers included the Department of Defense, Department of Homeland Security, United States Intelligence Community, NASA, aerospace contractors, and commercial telecommunications and wireless customers. In 2019, it merged with Harris Corporation to form L3Harris Technologies.
Thales S.A., trading as Thales Group is a French multinational company that designs, develops and manufactures electrical systems as well as devices and equipment for the aerospace, defence, transportation and security sectors. The company is headquartered in Paris' business district, La Défense, and its stock is listed on the Euronext Paris.
Rediffusion was a business that distributed radio and TV signals through wired relay networks. The business gave rise to a number of other companies, including Associated-Rediffusion, later known as Rediffusion London, the first ITV franchisee to go on air in the UK. Rediffusion also spawned a record label, Rediffusion International Music, in 1968.
Racal Electronics plc was a British electronics company that was founded in 1950.
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AAI Corporation is an aerospace and defense development and manufacturing firm, located in Hunt Valley, Maryland, US. Formerly a wholly owned subsidiary of United Industrial Corporation, AAI was acquired by Textron in 2007. It currently operates as a unit of Textron Systems and employs more than 2,000.
Thales Air Defence Limited (TADL), formerly Shorts Missile Systems (SMS), is a defence contractor based in Belfast, Northern Ireland, producing short range air defence missiles.
Thomson-CSF was a French company that specialized in the development and manufacture of electronics with a heavy focus upon the aerospace and defence sectors of the market.
Thales Underwater Systems or TUS is a subsidiary of the French defense electronics specialist Thales Group. It was created in 2001 and belongs to its naval division. It specializes in the development and manufacturing of sonar systems for submarines, surface warships and aircraft, as well as communications masts and systems for submarines. Its headquarters are located in Sophia Antipolis, France.
Moog Inc. is an American-based designer and manufacturer of electric, electro-hydraulic and hydraulic motion, controls and systems for applications in aerospace, defense, industrial and medical devices. The company operates under four segments: aircraft controls, space and defense controls, industrial controls, and components. Moog is headquartered in Elma, New York, and has sales, engineering, and manufacturing facilities in twenty-six countries.
Thales Nederland B.V. is a subsidiary of the French multinational company Thales Group based in the Netherlands.
Thales Optronics is a optronics manufacturer and a division of the French defence corporation Thales Group. It is headquartered in Paris. The company has three main subsidiaries: Thales Optronique SA in France, Thales Optronics Limited in the United Kingdom and Thales Optronics B.V in the Netherlands.
Frasca International, Inc., is an American manufacturer of flight simulation training devices, with over 3000 training devices delivered in approximately 70 countries throughout the world. Based in Urbana, Illinois, Frasca International was founded in Champaign, Illinois in 1958 by Rudy Frasca. It is owned by FlightSafety International, a division of Berkshire Hathaway, following an acquisition in 2022.
Frasca flight simulators are used in all segments of the aviation industry, including their extensive use in many prominent college aviation programs, including Purdue University, Indiana State University, Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, University of North Dakota, Liberty University, Louisiana Tech University, University of Illinois, and Western Michigan University.
The defense industry of Turkey has a long history, dated from the Ottoman Empire, and has changed several times during the Republic period.
GSE Systems, Inc. develops and markets software-based simulation and training products to nuclear, oil, and gas electricity generators, and the chemical process industries. It also sells software for monitoring and optimizing plant and signal analysis to the power industry.
Simulator rides are a type of amusement park or fairground ride, where the audience is shown a movie while their seats move to correspond to the action on screen.
Arotech Corporation is a defense and security products and services company. It manufactures and designs products for military and non-military air and ground vehicles; interactive simulation for military, law enforcement and commercial markets, and batteries and charging systems for the military. Arotech operates through two major business divisions: Interactive simulation for military, law enforcement and commercial markets, and batteries and power systems for the military.
The UK Military Flying Training System (UKMFTS) takes UK armed forces aircrew from initial training through elementary, basic, and advanced flying training phases, preparing them for their arrival at their designated operational aircraft units. It is operated by Ascent Flight Training, a consortium of Lockheed Martin and Babcock International under a 25-year Private Finance Initiative (PFI) contract for the UK's Ministry of Defence (MoD), with oversight from the MoD. The airworthiness authority for each aircraft type, for example, is fulfilled by military and civilian staff within Defence Equipment and Support. Apart from the overall contract, the main elements of the system include fixed-wing elementary, multi-engine and fast-jet pilot training, rear crew training and rotary-wing (helicopter) training.
L3Harris Commercial Aviation Solutions is a flight training provider and manufacturer of civil flight simulators based in Crawley, England. It is part of L3Harris, and was formed as L-3 Link Simulation & Training UK in 2012, when L3 acquired the civil fixed-wing simulation division of Thales Training & Simulation (TTS).
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