Although the Los Angeles region is no longer the clear leader in aerospace research and development, the industry still is vibrant on a smaller scale with several San Fernando Valley companies working on an extensive collection of private and military projects. And right in the middle of it all are some successful longstanding family firms, two of which are among the Business Journal’s Family Business Award winners this year. Palmdale-based Crissair Inc. boasts a product line of hydraulics parts that are on just about every aircraft, both military and civilian, that takes to the skies. It weathered the industry’s recession and emerged last year to report significant revenue growth. Worldwide Aeros Corp., with facilities in both Tarzana and Palmdale, manufactures airships for clients that range from foreign governments to private companies with advertising needs, and it is currently competing against Lockheed Martin to build a heavy lift aircraft, a combination of an airship, jet and helicopter, for the Pentagon, a contract that could eventually be worth hundreds of millions of dollars. Although they operate in separate parts of the industry, both companies have taken advantage of the region’s highly educated workforce and in some cases moved parts of the business out of the country. Linda Bradley, president and CEO of Crissair, said the company had to move some of its operations to Mexico in order to stay a profitable, growing company. “I have about 70 people down there, they do the machining part of the business,” Bradley said. Crissair has dealt with its share of pressure from workers’ compensation costs, and that without moving some operations out of the country, the company would be unable to stay competitive and meet its customers’ demands, she said. Bradley added that in operating its Tijuana factory, it’s able to pay those employees well and continue growing, doubling its total number of employees since opening the new factory about eight years ago. Bradley’s father moved the business to Palmdale from El Segundo 30 years ago, in part because he could buy more land to expand the business. The company has also taken advantage of the multitudes of highly trained aerospace workers in the area and has hired employees away from larger competitors like Lockheed and Boeing on more than one occasion. When the company’s marketing manager was getting ready to retire after almost 30 years with the company, Bradley went looking for outside talent, and hired Eric Mansholt from one of the company’s competitors. Mansholt proved to be a good hire, taking advantage of the troubled years for the industry that began in 2001 by building relationships with clients even if they weren’t buying at the time. When the industry started to revive in 2005, Bradley said, Crissair took advantage of those relationships and boosted its sales by more than 40 percent and it now employs close to 230 people. Bradley said that the diversity of its product line and efficient business practices ensure that Crissair will be able to thrive for years in Palmdale. Worldwide Aeros does not have anywhere close to the root system in Southern California that Crissair has developed, but it has nonetheless built a unique aerospace business in the San Fernando Valley. Founder Igor Pasternak started the business in the early 90s in the Ukraine, but moved to the United States after the collapse of the Soviet Union. The company re-emerged in Delaware, and eventually Governor Pete Wilson persuaded Pasternak to move to California. “We’ve got a facility in Riverside, but then we realized the commercial market was the wave of the future for the company, and the customer base is easier to do business with in Los Angeles,” said Edward Pevzner, manager of business development for the company. The company’s 40 employees put together airships, or blimps, in Tarzana and they are inflated in a Palmdale warehouse where clients looking to use them for advertising and surveillance purchase the ships. Pevzner said Worldwide Aeros has also been able to find all the highly educated employees it needs in the region, which will come in handy as the company is trying to win a contract from the Pentagon to build new heavy-lift aircrafts that will cost hundreds of millions of dollars and possibly revolutionize military operations as well as luxury travel. Decades ago, the near perfect flying weather in the Los Angeles region made it ideal for aerospace companies, and even recently the area has been home to projects like the F-117 stealth fighter, the B-2 Bomber and others. The C-17 cargo plan is produced here, as are parts for tactical systems, missile defense technology and host of other electronics components, according to research conducted by the Los Angeles Economic Development Corp. “Added to the technically superior workforce, the aerospace infrastructure is enhanced by outstanding educational institutions and the supporting research and development programs of the Air Force Flight Test Center at Edwards Air Force Base and the space and missile research and development at Los Angeles Air Force Base,” the corporation outlined in a report on the aerospace industry cluster. Students in the Los Angeles area study at the Graduate Aeronautical Laboratories at the California Institute of Technology, in engineering programs at California State University, Long Beach, California State Polytechnic University, Glendale Community College and numerous other programs. In the LAEDC’s economic forecast and industry outlook for 2006 and 2007, economists predicted that budget cuts at the Department of Defense might mean trouble for some of the larger defense projects in the region. The commercial aircraft sector looks significantly brighter, however, with industry giants like Boeing and Airbus filling huge orders over the last year, which will mean steady growth for the Valley’s smaller aerospace subcontractors as well. “While no commercial jets are assembled in the Los Angeles area (the last Boeing 717 moved onto the assembly line in Long Beach late in 2005), both Airbus and Boeing do a significant amount of subcontracting in the area,” the reports authors wrote. “Keeping aerospace manufacturing in the region is an ongoing challenge for Southern California, given the high cost of doing business in the state. Frequently, R & D; is done in the region, but any significant production line are moved to a lower-cost area.”
