Hong Kong firm aims to invest $100 mln in aircraft service in Dong Nai province

Hong Kong-headquartered Haeco Group aims to invest $100 million in the first phase of an aircraft service project in Vietnam’s southern province of Dong Nai, with about 1,000 employees.

Haeco CEO Frank Walshot made the proposal at a Wednesday meeting with Nguyen Hong Linh, Dong Nai's Party chief.

In the second phase, the firm aims to expand the workforce to 4,000 people, while cooperating with local firms in training laborers for airport services.

The firm also plans to invest in projects related to the under-construction Long Thanh International Airport in Dong Nai, like aircraft repair and maintenance, and proposed Dong Nai authorities support it in studying and surveying projects.

Established in Hong Kong in 1950, Haeco is one of the world’s leading independent aircraft engineering and maintenance groups. It is also one of the largest maintenance, repair and overhaul service providers in terms of capacity.

A key infrastructure project in Vietnam, Long Thanh International Airport will have a designed capacity of 100 million passengers per year. It is expected to help ease overloading at Tan Son Nhat International Airport in Ho Chi Minh City, a neighbor of Dong Nai province. The new airport will cover more than 5,580 hectares in Dong Nai's Long Thanh district.

The key national project, also Vietnam’s biggest airport project so far, is estimated to cost more than $14 billion to build and is set to open in 2025, after initial work began in 2021.

Air passenger transport in Vietnam reached 106 million in 2018 and peaked at 115.5 million in 2019, prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, according to data of the Civil Aviation Authority of Vietnam. The figure recovered to 55 million in post-pandemic 2022. In the first two months of this year, the number was 19.7 million, up 91.5% year-on-year.