Belcan buys TransDigm engineering firm Avista

The United States engineering firm Belcan has acquired software engineering provider Avista, which serves defence and other sectors, Belcan announced on 18 November.

Belcan is based in Cincinnati, Ohio. (Belcan)

Belcan CEO Lance Kwasniewski said that Wisconsin-based Avista “will add greater technical depth to Belcan’s Systems and Software Engineering Group and provide us with a larger footprint” in the US Midwest.

Avista, which has about 100 employees, has worked on such military aviation projects as a flight management system upgrade for the Boeing KC-135 Stratotanker refuelling plane; development of a satellite communication system for the Lockheed Martin C-130 Hercules transport plane; and development of software systems for the General Atomics Aeronautical Systems Inc MQ-9 Reaper and RQ-1 Predator B unmanned aircraft.

Avista President Steven Ungs said that becoming part of Belcan, which has about 10,000 employees, “will allow us to expand our network and offer our customers a broader array of services”.

Avista’s current management team, including Ungs, is slated to join Belcan. The financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.

TransDigm sold Avista as part of a “portfolio optimisation” it is conducting following its USD4 billion acquisition of Esterline Technologies in 2019, Belcan said. TransDigm indicated earlier this month that it was considering selling several defence businesses it inherited from Esterline.