Llanelec Precision Engineering, backed by Hanover Investors' Active Equity Fund III, has acquired Kigass Aero Components, a Warwick-based precision engineering business founded in 1924 specialising in aero-engine components for civil and defence aerospace and motorsport; the transaction consideration is not publicly disclosed.

Kigass Aero Components is a fourth-generation family business founded in 1924, headquartered in Warwick, manufacturing high-integrity machined components including fuel injectors, fuel burners, fuel manifolds and oil jets for civil and defence aero-engines, as well as precision components for elite motorsport applications. Revenue and EBITDA are not publicly disclosed. Managing director Peter Platt will remain in post through and following the transition.

'Llanelec Precision Engineering is a Neath, Wales-based specialist CNC machining company founded in 1984, operating from a 120,000 sq ft facility with over 60 CNC machine centres, manufacturing integral components for UK MoD military vehicle programmes including Ajax, Boxer and Challenger platforms. Neither company discloses revenue or EBITDA publicly. Advisors: Cattaneo Corporate Finance and Mills & Reeve (Kigass shareholders); Heligan Group, Foot Anstey and Interpath (Llanelec and Hanover).

The structural driver is consolidation in the UK precision aerospace and defence machining sector, where OEM supply chain rationalisation is forcing prime contractors to favour larger, more resilient multi-capability suppliers over single-site machining specialists. Both Llanelec and Kigass operate in the same mid-tier supplier layer: technically differentiated, long-established, but sub-scale relative to supply chain requirements of next-generation defence and civil aviation programmes. The combination deepens Llanelec's aerospace capability alongside its defence vehicle heritage and broadens its customer base across civil aviation.

Kigass's century of aero-engine component manufacturing is the harder asset to replicate. Fuel system components for civil and defence aero-engines require AS9100 quality systems, NADCAP process approvals and long customer qualification cycles — the barriers to entry that make established players like Kigass attractive acquisition targets at a moment when UK aerospace supply chain resilience is a stated government industrial policy priority.

For Ireland, the consolidation of UK precision aerospace machining has a direct read-across for Irish aerospace supply chain participants in the Shannon and Cork clusters supplying Pratt & Whitney, GE Aerospace and Safran programmes. The same consolidation pressure is building in the Irish mid-tier, and Hanover's Llanelec platform is a template for how it will resolve.

Source: aero-mag.com / hanoverinvestors.com / kroll.com / footanstey.com / cattaneocf.co.uk