Finmeccanica S.p.A. is an Italian conglomerate. Finmeccanica is the second largest industrial group and the largest of the hi-tech industrial groups based in Italy. It operates in seven sectors: Aeronautics, Helicopters, Space, Defence and Security Electronics, Defence Systems, Energy and Transportation. The company has offices in over 100 countries. It is partially owned by the Italian government, which holds about 30% of Finmeccanica's shares.

History[link]

This section requires expansion.

The company was established in 1948 as a subholding for mechanical industry of state owned IRI. Finmeccanica has held for years some historical Italian enterprises, as Alfa Romeo, Aeritalia and Ansaldo; Finmeccanica presence in aerospace field was restricted to Aeritalia, the biggest airplane manufacturer of Italy.

From 1960s to 1980s Italy's defence and aerospace industry was split in different state-holding entities: so Efim owned the helicopters manufacturer Agusta, the defence company Oto Melara and the electronic enterprise Officine Galileo whereas STET (another IRI subsidiary) held Selenia, Elsag and SGS Thomson, all electronic enterprises with specializations in security and defense. In 1989 an internal IRI reorganization process brought STET electronic enterprises to Finmeccanica, that from Aeritalia-Selenia merger made up its aerospace subsidiary Alenia. In 1992 Efim wound up because of troubled financial situation; so Agusta, Oto Melara, Officine Galileo and Breda passed to Finmeccanica, which became one of the most important Italian industrial groups. Finmeccanica, which was previously fully state owned by IRI, went under a privatization process in 1993, when it was listed in Milan Borsa Italiana.

In 1992 Finmeccanica's Agusta became a 32% partner in NHIndustries, the prime contractor for NH90 helicopter, along with Eurocopter (62.5%) and Fokker (5.5%).

In July 2000 Finmeccanica and the British GKN plc agreed to merge their respective helicopter subsidiaries (Agusta and GKN-Westland Helicopters) to form AgustaWestland. On May 26, 2004 GKN confirmed that it would sell its share to its Finmeccanica for £1.06 billion.

In December 2001 the missile business of Alenia Marconi Systems (AMS), a joint Finmeccanica/BAE Systems company, was merged with other European missile manufacturers to form MBDA which thus became the world's second largest missile manufacturer.^[4]

In July 2003 Finmeccanica and BAE Systems announced their intention to set up three joint venture companies, to be collectively known as Eurosystems. These companies would have pooled the avionics, C4ISTAR and communications businesses of the two companies.^[5] However the difficulties of integrating the companies in this way led to a re-evaluation of the proposal; BAE's 2004 Annual Report states that "recognizing the complexity of the earlier proposed Eurosystems transaction with Finmeccanica we have moved to a simpler model". The main part of this deal was the dissolution of AMS and the establishment of SELEX Sensors and Airborne Systems. In late March 2007 BAE Systems sold its 25% share of SELEX Sensors and Airborne Systems to Finmeccanica for €400 million (approx. £270 million c. 2007).^[6] SELEX S&AS now operates as SELEX Galileo following a merger with Galileo Avionica S.p.A. (another Finmeccanica company) in January 2008.

In May 2008 Finmeccanica announced its intention to purchase the U.S. defense contractor DRS Technologies for nearly $5.2 billion. On October 22, 2008, the sale of DRS Technologies was finalized.^[7]

In 2011 the company faced accusations that it had created slush funds with which to bribe politicians and chairman Pier Francesco Guarguaglini came under investigation. He denied any wrong doing but, following pressure from Prime Minister Mario Monti, he stepped down from his post on 1 December receiving a golden handshake of 4 million Euros.^[1][2]

Organization[link]

Through its Alenia Aermacchi subsidiary, Finmeccanica is a 21% shareholder of Eurofighter GmbH.

Aeronautics

• Alenia Aermacchi
• ATR (50%) ATR is the world leader in the 50 to 74-seat turboprop market^[8][9]
• Superjet International (51%)

Helicopters

• AgustaWestland (100%)^[10]

Space

• Thales Alenia Space (33%)
• Telespazio (67%)

Defence and Security Electronics

• DRS Technologies
• SELEX Galileo
• SELEX Sistemi Integrati
• SELEX Elsag

Energy and Transportation

• Ansaldo Energia
  The company has more than a hundred years of power generation experience and an installed capacity exceeding 153,000 MW in over 75 countries. Revenues in 2003 stood at 802 million euros.
• Ansaldo Fuel Cells
  In June 2004 Ansaldo Fuel Cells inaugurated the Terni industrial fuel cell production facility for stationary applications. The production capacity, initially 3 MW, should have reached 15 MW by 2006.
• AnsaldoBreda
  Heavy and Light Rail Vehicles are to be found in Denmark (83 diesel trains and 34 metro cars), Norway (36 electric trains+16 light metro vehicles), Madrid (180 heavy metro vehicles), Gothenburg (40 Sirio light rail stock), Birmingham+Manchester (32+6 light metro vehicles), Lille (24 light metro vehicles), SanFrancisco+Boston (151+100 light metro vehicles), Atlanta+LosAngeles (100+42 heavy metro vehicles), and Athens (35 Sirio light rail vehicles).
• BredaMenarinibus^[11]
  The second largest manufacturer of buses in Italy, based in Bologna. It has a workforce of 300 employees and a turnover of about 100 million euros.
• Ansaldo STS (40%)

Defence Systems

• Oto Melara
• Whitehead Alenia Sistemi Subacquei (WASS)
• MBDA (25%)

Joint ventures[link]

• MBDA (25%)
• Horizon SAS and EuroSysNav
  50-50 joint ventures between DCNS of France and Finmeccanica/Fincantieri of Italy. France and Italy placed a combined order for 27 FREMMs to be delivered by 2016 at a cost of US$16 billion (€11 billion), making it Western Europe's largest naval project to date.^[12][13]
• EuroTorp
  50-50 joint venture between Finmeccanica and DCN/Thales of France. EuroTorp is the world market leader for lightweight torpedoes, and the European leading company in antisubmarine weapon systems.
• NHIndustries (32%)^[14]
• Eurofighter GmbH (21%)
  Joint venture with EADS and BAE Systems for co-ordination of the design, production and upgrade of Eurofighter Typhoon.
• Global Military Aircraft Systems (GMAS) between Alenia North America Inc and L-3 IS (subsidiary of L-3 Communications) in order to compete for the FCA program (Future Cargo Aircraft):
• Superjet 100
• NEUROn

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official website

Companies portal

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