Safran in exclusive discussions with Hexcel for sale of Structil

Safran Ceramics, along with co-shareholder Mitsubishi Chemical Corporation, have started exclusive discussions with Hexcel to sell all shares and voting rights in the company Structil, jointly owned by Safran Ceramics (80.05%) and Mitsubishi Chemical Corporation (19.95%). Structil become part of Safran when the latter acquired SNPE’s energetic materials business in 2011. Structil designs, produces and sells structural adhesives and high-performance carbon-fiber composite materials for aerospace and other high-tech industries. In 2016 Structil recorded sales of €19m. It has about 70 employees at its plant in Vert-Le-Petit, near Paris.
Hexcel, a benchmark vendor for Safran, is a global leader in advanced composites technology. It has over 6,300 employees worldwide, including more than 1,000 in France at five plants, and posted sales of about US$2bn in 2016 (more than one-fourth in France). Over 85% of its sales are to the aerospace sector, including products for airplanes from Airbus (especially the A350 XWB) and Boeing, and the LEAP engine from Safran.