Minebea Co. Ltd. (Japan) said it plans even more aggressive market and manufacturing expansion efforts for its rod end and spherical bearing product lines, especially into the aerospace industry.

Already dominant in the world market for rod end bearings, Minebea holds a 60% share. They are also the world's largest manufacturer of miniature bearings, with a similar market share.

In particular, Minebea company said it will be building on recent supply contract wins to further extend its aerospace bearing market penetration.

Minebea recently won a contract to supply rod end and spherical bearings to Airbus SAS for its upcoming A380 jet airliners, due in 2006. The A380 will be the world's largest airliner, with two full-length levels of seating and two aisles in each. A standard passenger configuration, with generous seating areas and open space, will carry 555 passengers. In freight configuration, the plane will have three cargo decks.

Although Airbus released no information about how many bearings each A380 will use, Alcoa revealed it supplies more than one million fasteners for each A380.

As part of its new program, Minebea has earmarked USD $6.4 million to expand rod end and spherical bearing manufacturing capacity in existing plants in the United States, Japan and the United Kingdom.

Looking to the future, Minebea said it is also developing a wider variety of nonferrous aerospace bearings made from advanced composites, metal matrix, aluminum, titanium, and other materials.


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