Location

As a technology driver, the aerospace industry has considerable strategic significance to Germany as a centre of industry and innovation. Saxony’s aerospace industry is steeped in tradition, and today the Free State is one of the industry’s key locations. Around 160 organisations, businesses and research institutions employ more than 7,000 people in this sector, generating sales of around €1.4 billion.

In Thuringia are more than 60 actors with more than 5,000 people operating in this sector.

The industry’s core strengths are in aircraft equipment and modification, aircraft and spacecraft component manufacture, testing of aircraft and spacecraft structures, aerospace technology R&D projects, passenger aviation and aircraft servicing. External industrial research institutions, scientific and technical service providers and transfer, consultancy and other services complete the picture.

This expertise is embedded in an outstanding research landscape which includes the Dresden and Chemnitz Universities of Applied Sciences and many applied research institutions.

Centre of research excellence

The research landscape in Saxony and Thuringia is second to none, with eight state universities, ten universities of applied sciences, six colleges of art and a large number of high-performing non-university research establishments. Scientists carry out their work at nine Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Scientific Association (WGL) institutes, three branches of the Senkenberg Gesellschaft affiliated to the WGL, two Helmholtz Centres, two Helmholtz Institute, three German Centres for Health Research, 18 Fraunhofer institutions, ten Max Planck Institutes and twelve research institutions financed by the Free State of Saxony.