Deutsche Aircraft goes back to future as it inaugurates Leipzig final assembly line

Sierra Nevada-owned airframer says factory marks transition of D328eco from development to serial production.
Sixty-five years ago, communist East Germany’s dream of creating its own airliner – the 50-seat VEB Flugzeugwerke Baade 152 – ended shortly after the fatal crash of the prototype. Four decades later, Germany’s last domestically-built commercial aircraft, the Fairchild Dornier 728 regional jet, failed to make it to first flight, the company declaring bankruptcy days after the 2002 roll-out ceremony at its Oberpfaffenhofen factory.

Now, almost a quarter of a century on, Deutsche Aircraft – successor to the original Dornier and, like its predecessor, based in Oberpfaffenhofen – believes this time it will be different.

Following a €100 million ($113 million) investment in a new final assembly line (FAL) for the D328eco at Leipzig-Halle airport, the Sierra Nevada-owned firm says it is bringing full aircraft production back not just to Germany, but to the state of Saxony, birthplace of the Baade 152.

On 29 September, at an event attended by more than 200 suppliers, prospective customers, media, and representatives of local, state and federal administrations, Deutsche Aircraft inaugurated the 60,500sq m (651,000sq ft) complex. Aside from the FAL, it includes a flight-readiness hangar, logistics centre, and offices. Still empty, save for two production jigs and a pair of partially disassembled legacy D328s, it will have a capacity of 48 aircraft per year.

The company says it marks the “transition of the D328eco programme from development to serial production, establishing Leipzig as the production home of Germany’s next-generation regional aircraft”. The prototype of the Pratt & Whitney Canada PW127XT-S-powered D328eco – which has a longer fuselage and more modern cockpit than the original D328 – is now expected to take to the air next year, with customer production beginning in 2028.

That timetable raises questions over the company’s most recent entry-into-service target of late 2027. At the ceremony, chief executive Nico Neumann said nothing about when the first examples of the aircraft would reach customers.

Last September – a few months after unveiling its TAC1 prototype, minus its engines, at Oberpfaffenhofen – the company was suggesting mid-2027 for first flight and the final quarter of 2027 for certification. At its launch, the airframer had targeted 2025 for service entry.

Sebastian Bohnl, Deutsche Aircraft’s vice-president operations & production, has the job of preparing the FAL for final assembly. With the company’s flight test and engineering teams based – and set to remain – 280 miles (450km) south in Oberpfaffenhofen, he and a small team have been working out how to configure the plant ahead of a recruitment drive that will eventually create 250 jobs in a state where unemployment exceeds the national average.

Neumann says would-be operators and suppliers have been crucial to the progress of the programme so far. Customers were behind its switch to design its own landing gear, with certification flights beginning on 5 August, using a legacy D328 as a testbed. Meanwhile, more than 100 vendors attended Deutsche Aircraft’s first suppliers day on the eve of the opening event. “The commitment of our supply chain is essential,” says Neumann.

However, establishing a reliable supply chain, recruiting and training staff and building an efficient factory, securing certification, and ramping up production to roughly one aircraft a week, are all just one side of the challenge facing the prospective manufacturer. Deutsche Aircraft, which claims to have letters of intent commitments for 134 aircraft, but no firm orders, also has to create a market for its 40-seat turboprop airliner.

On past and current evidence, that market looks modest. In the decade it was in production between 1991 and 2000, Dornier produced 107 D328s (another 110 jet-powered versions of the aircraft were also delivered, but that is not being revived). Up to 100 D328s are thought to be still in service. ATR, the only present-day manufacturer in that segment, has delivered ATR 42-600s in low-single figures in recent years, far fewer than the larger ATR 72-600.

Despite Deutsche Aircraft’s predictions of a looming replacement market and emerging new opportunities for small regional turboprops, the fact is that the high cost of fuel, parts, and pilots have made the 40-seater market virtually obsolete. The company also faces the risk that efficient, electrically-powered small airliners, such as Heart Aerospace’s in-development ES-36, could soak up what is left of the market and leave the D328eco an impressive horse and cart in an age of automobiles.

There is an irony to Deutsche Aircraft choosing Leipzig to build its new-generation jet. Despite serving a major conurbation and being a hub for DHL and other air cargo operators, the airport has few passenger connections to German cities. Marie-Christine von Hahn, managing director of the BDLI aerospace association, drew attention to this fact at the ceremony, wryly asking attendees if any of them had managed to fly directly to the event.

Hopes that Lufthansa – or anyone else – might order the D328eco to relaunch a raft of domestic services within Germany are probably fanciful. Perhaps a bigger hope is that Berlin, with its new focus on upscaling its defence, might opt for a militarised version of the type. At June’s ILA air show in Berlin, Deutsche Aircraft displayed an uncrewed concept variant of the D328eco, the D328MR, with an eye on the military and special mission market.

In his presentation, Neumann hailed the progress Deutsche Aircraft has made, including managing to inaugurate the factory just one-and-a-half years from breaking ground. However, he acknowledged the scale of the task the company faces 11 years after its parent secured the rights to the D328 from its previous owner 328 Support Services. “Developing a new aircraft is a marathon,” he noted.

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