Kinston's Airbus plant marks new chapter as A350 composite manufacturing hub

At Kinston's North Carolina Global TransPark, a factory that once supplied Airbus through a contractor is now part of Airbus itself — placing the former Spirit AeroSystems operation directly inside the A350 production system. Airbus signed a definitive agreement to acquire the Spirit AeroSystems assets in April 2025, completed the acquisition on Dec. 8, 2025, and immediately commenced operations under the new name Airbus Aerosystems Kinston.

The company has designated the 500,000-square-foot plant an Airbus Center of Excellence for advanced composite manufacturing. Workers fabricate composite center-fuselage sections and all-composite front wing spars for the A350 — components shipped to France for final assembly, linking eastern North Carolina manufacturing directly to European aerospace production. Every A350 flying today carries structures built in Kinston.

For the community, the change is more than a new sign on the building: the plant is no longer a subcontractor answering to Wichita but a direct player in Toulouse-led global aerospace manufacturing.

Robin Hayes, Chairman and CEO of Airbus in North America, said, "We are proud to welcome our newest employees to the Airbus family... The aerostructures work being done in Kinston is vital to Airbus' global industrial ramp up, making the site a pace setter for the A350 program."

Daryl Taylor, Senior Vice President of Commercial Aircraft Manufacturing (North America) at Airbus, said, "The Kinston team is critical to the program's success, manufacturing components that are quite literally the backbone of the aircraft as Airbus continues to invest in the North Carolina community."

Marc Swinkels, General Manager of Airbus Aerosystems Kinston, said, "While the tooling is state-of-the-art, it is the dedication of the highly skilled local team that drives the site's alignment with Airbus' world-class quality and safety standards."

The workforce includes a significant portion of U.S. military veterans, consistent with Airbus's broader U.S. operations. These workers now report to Airbus rather than to an independent supplier — a shift that could make the Kinston operation more central to Airbus planning. It does not, on its own, guarantee more jobs, higher local purchasing, or protection from future production decisions.

The move from Spirit's Wichita-centered vendor network to Airbus's global procurement system also reshapes supply-chain relationships. Kinston-area suppliers have reason to watch whether that creates new business or routes it elsewhere.

For Kinston, that is not an academic concern. The transition follows decades in which major manufacturing employers closed or sharply downsized, teaching the community that corporate announcements do not automatically produce lasting local security.

Airbus continues to ramp up A350 production, driving demand for the fuselage sections and wing spars produced in Kinston. Whether increased production translates to workforce growth at the facility has not been disclosed.

The Center of Excellence designation and direct integration into Airbus's supply chain position the facility as a strategic hub. But for a community that has lived through repeated manufacturing losses, the measure of this new chapter will be whether direct ownership brings durable work and local opportunity — or leaves Kinston's future dependent on corporate decisions made in Toulouse rather than Wichita.