Cobham puts faith in efficiency

In addition, the company said it had continued to "win positions in faster growing geographies", with work on the Chinese C919 commercial aircraft, the Indian Air Force Hawk advanced jet trainer, the indigenous Korean Utility Helicopter and significant programmes in the Middle East. Reporting a marginal increase both in revenue for 2010 to £1.9bn and in underlying pre-tax profit to £306m, Cobham said its operational improvement and efficiency programme, called EiD (Excellence in Delivery), involved rolling out a standard operating framework across 14 principal sites, integrating smaller production facilities, establishing standard processes in a standard Enterprise Resource Planning system and setting up shared service centres. It would, the company said, bring benefits including improved productivity, shortened manufacturing lead times and improved quality. The programme was announced last November and a webcast is available on www.cobhaminvestors.com/reports. By the end of 2013, the Cobham expects the benefits from EiD, which will cost a total of £131m, to be at a run-rate of £65m a year. Commenting on the results and outlook, CEO Andy Stevens (pictured) said: "Good revenue growth in certain strategic business units was masked by order slippages on significant defence and security programmes and some continuing softness in certain commercial markets. We have made encouraging progress on Excellence in Delivery and achieved cost savings which have contributed to earnings growth from flat Group revenue." The Board had confidence, he added that the Group would continue to make progress over the medium term.