Rolls-Royce

Statue of Sir Henry Royce outside the Rolls-Royce HQ, Victory Road, Derby, April 1991

British civil aircraft engine maker; the second-largest in the world, behind General Electric Aviation. The company has related businesses in the defence aerospace, marine and energy markets.

Rolls-Royce was nationalised in 1971, by which time aircraft engines had long been the most significant part of the business. The automobile company was separated in 1973 and the present Rolls-Royce plc was re-privatised in 1987. Rolls-Royce is, through its defence aerospace division, the world's 18th largest defence contractor. Defence aerospace sales accounted for 23% of group sales in 2004, civil aerospace 51%, marine 16% and energy 8%.

1 History
2 Nationalisation & separation
3 Privatisation & expansion
4 Allison acquisition
5 1999 acquisitions
6 Recent events
7 Current operations
8 Civil Aerospace
9 FEEDBACK

History

Rolls-Royce Limited was founded in 1906 by Henry Royce and The Honourable Charles Rolls and produced its first aircraft engine in 1914.

Around half the aircraft engines used by the Allies in World War I were made by Rolls-Royce. By the late 1920s, aero engines made up most of Rolls-Royce's business. Henry Royce's last design was the Merlin aero engine, which came out in 1935 although he had died in 1933. This was a development subsequent to the R engine, which had powered a record-breaking Supermarine S6.B seaplane to almost 400mph in the 1931 Schneider Trophy. The Merlin powered many World War II aircraft: the British Hawker Hurricane, Supermarine Spitfire, De Havilland Mosquito (twin-engined), Avro Lancaster (4-engine), Vickers Wellington (2-engine); it also transformed the American P-51 Mustang into one of the best fighters of its time, its Merlin engine built by Packard under licence. Over 160,000 Merlin engines were produced.

In the post-World War II period Rolls-Royce made significant advances in gas turbine engine design and manufacture. The Dart and Tyne turboprop engines were particularly important, enabling airlines to cut journey times within several continents, whilst jet airliners were introduced on longer services. The Dart engine was used in Argosy, Avro 748, Friendship, Herald and Viscount aircraft, whilst the more powerful Tyne powered the Atlantic, Transall and the Vanguard. Many of these turboprops are still in service.

Rolls-Royce engines had traditionally borne numeric designations during development and then were assigned the name of a British river on delivery. The use of river names was introduced with the earliest Rolls jet engines to reflect their nature: a steady flow of power rather than the pulses of a piston engine. RB stands for "Rolls Barnoldswick", the latter a major ex-Rover facility bought by Rolls-Royce when it traded production of engines (the Rolls Royce Meteor) for production of the first Whittle engines.

Amongst the jet engines of this period was the RB163 Spey which powers the Trident, BAC 1-11, Grumman Gulfstream II and Fokker F28.

During the late 1950s and '60s there was a significant rationalisation of the British aero-engine manufacturers, culminating in the merger of Rolls-Royce and Bristol Siddeley in 1966. Bristol Siddeley, which had itself resulted from the merger of Armstrong Siddeley and Bristol in 1959, and with its principal factory at Filton, near Bristol, had a strong base in military engines, including the Olympus, which was chosen for Concorde.

Nationalisation & separation

Having been selected as the sole engine supplier for the Lockheed L-1011 (TriStar), Rolls-Royce committed heavily to the RB211 engine, but its development was hampered by considerable problems and on February 4, 1971 Rolls-Royce went into administrative receivership. To save the company, Edward Heath's government nationalised it. The automotive division was separated from the aircraft engine division in 1973 as Rolls-Royce Motors.

Privatisation & expansion

Rolls-Royce plc was privatised in 1987 under the government of Margaret Thatcher. The 1980s saw the introduction of a policy to offer an engine on every civil aircraft type, with the company's engines now powering 17 different airliners (and their variants) compared to General Electric's 14 and Pratt & Whitney's 10.

In 1988, Rolls-Royce acquired Northern Engineering Industries (NEI), a group of heavy engineering companies mainly associated with electrical generation and power management, based in the North East of England. The group included Clarke Chapman (Cranes), Reyrolle (now part of VA Tech) and Parsons (now part of Siemens Steam turbines). The company was renamed Rolls Royce Industrial Power Group. It was sold off piecemeal over the next decade as the company re-focused on its core aero-engine operations following the recession of the early 1990s.

In 1990 BMW and Rolls-Royce established the BMW Rolls-Royce joint venture to produce the BR700 range of engines for regional and corporate jets.

Allison acquisition

In November 1994 Rolls-Royce announced its intention to acquire the Allison Engine Company, an American manufacturer of gas turbines and components for aviation, industrial and marine engines. Rolls-Royce had previously tried to buy the company when General Motors sold it in 1993, but GM opted for a management buyout instead. Owing to Allison's involvement in classified and export restricted technology, the 1994 acquisition was subject to investigation to determine the national security implications. On 27 March 1995 the Department of Defense announced that the "deal between Allison Engine Co. and Rolls-Royce does not endanger national security." Rolls-Royce was, however, obliged to set up a proxy board to manage Allison and had also to set up a separate company, Allison Advanced Development Company, Inc., to manage classified programmes "that involve leading-edge technologies". In 2000 this restriction was replaced by a more flexible Special Security Arrangement.

The Allison acquisition brought four new engine types into the Rolls-Royce civil engine portfolio on seven platforms and several light aircraft applications. Allison is now known as Rolls-Royce Corporation, part of Rolls-Royce North America.

In 1996 Rolls-Royce and Airbus signed a Memorandum of Understanding specifiying the Trent 900 as the engine of choice for the then A3XX, now the Airbus A380.

1999 acquisitions

Rolls-Royce spent £1.063 billion on acquisitions in 1999. These were interests of Cooper Energy Services (with the effect of making the Cooper Rolls joint venture a wholly owned subsidiary of Rolls-Royce) , Vickers, National Airmotive Corporation and BMW's share of BMW Rolls-Royce.

Rolls-Royce acquired Vickers plc for its marine businesses. Vickers had expanded this part of its business in the period leading up to the purchase, acquiring Kamewa, a manufacturer of waterjets, in 1996, and Ulstein, a major marine propulsion and engineering company, in 1998. Rolls-Royce sold Vickers Defence Systems (the other major Vickers area of business) to Alvis plc in 2002 which then became Alvis Vickers, then the largest armoured vehicle company in the UK.

Rolls-Royce has established a leading position in the corporate and regional airline sector through the development of the Tay engine, the Allison acquisition and the consolidation of the BMW Rolls-Royce joint venture. In 1999 BMW Rolls-Royce was renamed Rolls-Royce Deutschland and became a 100% owned subsidiary of Rolls-Royce plc.

Data Systems & Solutions was founded in 1999 as a joint venture between Rolls-Royce plc and Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC). In early 2006, SAIC exited the joint venture agreement, making Rolls-Royce plc the sole owner.

Recent events

On April 6, 2004, Boeing announced that it had selected both Rolls-Royce and General Electric to power its new 787. Rolls-Royce submitted the Trent 1000, a further development of that series. GE's offering is the GENX, a development of the GE90.

On June 13 Rolls Royce were awarded a £110m deal with the Ministry of Defence to supply engines for its C-130 Hercules transport aircraft for the next 5 years.

In July 2006, Rolls-Royce reached an agreement to supply a new version of the Trent for the revised Airbus A350 (XWB) jetliner. Although details have yet to be released, it is likely that the so-called Trent XWB will be significantly larger than the Trent 1700, basically a throttle-push of the Trent 1000 intended for the original A350 proposal.

In October 2006 Rolls-Royce announced that it would suspend production of its Trent 900 engine because of delays by Airbus on the delivery of the A380 superjumbo. Rolls-Royce has not confirmed any arrangements for staff working on the project, who could be suspended for 12 months. Rolls-Royce has said it will consult with Airbus and then with the union. The plant in Derby, UK employs 11,000 workers and will continue to produce engines for Bombardier, Boeing, including those for the new 787 series and other Airbus aircraft such as the A330 and A340.

Current operations

Rolls-Royce's aerospace business makes commercial and military gas turbine engines for military, civil, and corporate aircraft customers worldwide. In the U.S., the company makes engines for regional and corporate jets, helicopters, and turboprop aircraft. Rolls-Royce also constructs and installs power generation systems. Its core gas turbine technology has created one of the broadest product ranges of aero-engines in the world, with 50,000 engines in service with 500 airlines, 2,400 corporate and utility operators and more than 100 armed forces, powering both fixed- and rotary-wing aircraft. Rolls-Royce Marine Power Operations Ltd (a subsidiary company)manufactures and tests nuclear reactors for Royal Naval submarines.

Civil Aerospace

Airliners

RB211
Trent series (45% (largest) market share of engines for new generation widebodied aircraft, launch engine for all 3 787 variants, leading engine for 777, A330, A340-500 and A340-600 aircraft.)

V2500 (as part of International Aero Engines)
Conway
Avon
Olympus (with Snecma)

Regional aircraft

AE 2100
AE 3007
BR700
FJ44 (with Williams International)
Model 250
Tay

Helicopters

Model 250

Defence Aerospace

Combat aircraft

Adour (with Turbomeca)
EJ200 (as part of Eurojet)
F136 (with General Electric)
Pegasus
RB199 (as part of Turbo-Union)
Spey
Nene
Derwent

Helicopters

AE 1107C-Liberty
Gem
Model 250 turboshaft
MTR390 (with MTU and Turbomeca)
RTM322 (with Turbomeca)
T800 (with Honeywell)

Transport market

AE 1107C-Liberty
AE 2100
Model 250 turboprop
T56
Tay
TP400-D6 (as part of Europrop International)

Trainer market

Adour (with Turbomeca)
FJ44 (with Williams International)
Model 250 turboprop
Viper

Tactical market

AE 1107C-Liberty
AE 2100
AE 3007
BR710
Model 250 turboprop
Spey
T56
T800 (with Honeywell)
Tay

Unmanned aerial vehicle market

AE 3007
Model 250 turboshaft
Viper

Marine

Gas turbines

AG9140
MT30
MT50
RR4500
Spey
Olympus TM3B
Tyne RM1A
WR-21

Diesel engines

Bergen B series
Bergen C series
Bergen K series
Crossley Pielstick

Propulsion

Kamewa and Bird-Johnson Waterjets
Kamewa Tunnel thruster
MerMaid pod propulsion
Ulstein Aquamaster Azimuth thruster

Submarine

Nato Submarine Rescue System
PWR1 Reactor
PWR2 Reactor
Zebra (battery)

Energy - oil & gas turbines

Rolls-Royce 501
Industrial Avon
Industrial RB211
Industrial Trent

Compressors

Barrel centrifugal compressor
Pipeline centrifugal compressor

Energy - power generation

Gas turbines

   * Rolls-Royce 501
   * Industrial RB211
   * Industrial Trent

Reciprocating engines

   * Bergen B series
   * Bergen K series

Distributed generation systems

   * Field Electrical Power Source (FEPS)
   * APU 2000 vehicle power unit
   * Marine generator sets

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