Aerospace Industry Takes Flight
in Asheville, NC
Pratt & Whitney Asheville Operations Top $1 B
Over the past five years, Pratt & Whitney, a Raytheon Technologies company, has deepened its commitment to Asheville, North Carolina—helping position the region as a rising force in aerospace manufacturing.
In October 2020, the company announced a landmark $650 million investment to build a facility dedicated to producing turbine airfoils for next-generation jet engines, including the GTF™ and F135. Alongside this investment, the company committed to creating up to 800 high-quality jobs by 2027. By November 2022, the 1 million-square-foot, state-of-the-art advanced manufacturing facility was fully operational.
In January 2025, citing Asheville’s exceptional workforce and innovative community college ecosystem, Pratt & Whitney announced an additional $285 million expansion to increase production capacity and meet surging global demand. This second phase will add 325 more skilled jobs, bringing the company’s total projected investment in the region to over $1 billion and the number of new jobs to more than 1,125.
Together, these investments underscore Pratt & Whitney’s long-term vision for Asheville—and signal to the world that Western North Carolina is a premier destination for the future of aerospace.
Skilled, Creative, Diverse
There’s a long-standing tradition in Buncombe County of creating products and making them work effectively. A legacy of self-sufficiency in the region embraces doing it right the first time while making superior products that stand the test of time. This creative, quality-driven culture is evident in Asheville’s manufacturing community today, where well over 600 companies manufacture products in the four-county Asheville Metropolitan Statistical Area. The diversity of aviation and aerospace products is impressive including state-of-the-art Ceramic Matrix Composites, precision metal tooling and engine components as well as avionics systems for guidance and navigation.
Newly Released Aerospace Sites
- 5 – 25 Acre Parcels Available
- Parcels offer Taxiway Access
- Airport Will Subdivide
- 8,001′ x 150′ Runway
- Dedicated Public Safety Dept.
- US 1-26 Adjacent – Ideal Visibility
- $90M Airfield Expansion Completed 2021
- $420M Terminal & Tower Expansion Underway
fact: 30% Growth in Aerospace Products and Parts Manufacturing industry in the Asheville Metro over the past 5 years.
Precision Metalwork and Advanced Materials
Metals machining and advanced materials companies have a long history of success in Asheville due to a legacy of precision machining and metals fabrication in the Western North Carolina as well as forward looking educational investments such as the Composites Training Center of Excellence at Asheville-Buncombe Technical Community College.
GE Aerospace Takes Flight in Asheville
GE Aerospace is a world-leading provider of jet and turboprop engines, components and integrated systems for aircraft. With a workforce soon to exceed 550 in Asheville, North Carolina, GE Aerospace currently produces precision machined rotating and non-rotating components for jet engines. In announcements of June 2013 and March 2018, the company announced transformational investments in the State of North Carolina, totaling over $230,000,000 in its Asheville facility that will become a regional center of manufacturing excellence for Ceramic Matrix Composites (CMC), and the first ever to mass produce and machine the advanced material. CMC development is an enabling technology in several of GE Aerospace’s private and government-funded engine programs, contributing to an estimated $150B in industrial backlog for GE Aerospace engines worldwide.
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