HAVELSAN Opens New Flight Simulator Production Center

Türkiye’s leading defence technology company, HAVELSAN, has officially broken ground on a facility set to change the landscape of aviation training across two continents. The new flight simulator production center in Ankara marks a major leap forward not just for the company, but for Türkiye’s position in the global aerospace industry.

A Ceremony Fit for the Occasion

The groundbreaking wasn’t a quiet affair. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan personally chaired the ceremony, joined by HAVELSAN Chairman Prof. Dr. Hacı Ali Mantar and CEO Dr. Mehmet Akif Nacar, alongside senior government officials and industry figures. That level of attention from the top speaks volumes about how significant this project is considered at a national level.

What’s Being Built and Why It Matters

Spanning 17,000 square meters, the new Simulator Production and Integration Facility is designed with serious scale in mind. Once operational, it will be capable of producing more than 30 simulators per year, with up to 16 units moving through different stages of development simultaneously.

When combined with the company’s existing Ankara infrastructure, HAVELSAN’s total active capacity will climb to around 40 civil and military simulators at any one time. That’s the kind of throughput that puts it squarely among the biggest players in the region and the company isn’t shy about that goal. Upon completion, the facility is expected to become the largest flight simulator production hub in both Europe and the Middle East.

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Home-Grown Technology at the Core

One of the more interesting aspects of this expansion is what it means for HAVELSAN’s technology roadmap. The new facility will support the development of next-generation systems, including the recently unveiled STARVIEW-B collimated display an in-house visual system built by the company’s Display Systems team.

STARVIEW-B is designed to sharpen the realism of pilot training environments, improving both immersion and procedural accuracy. It’s part of a broader push through HAVELSAN’s STARLINE FSTD product portfolio to reduce dependence on foreign subsystems and build globally competitive simulators from the ground up.

Jobs, Growth and National Programmes

Set to come online in 2027, the facility is expected to bring hundreds of high-skilled engineering and technical jobs to the Ankara region. That’s a meaningful contribution to Türkiye’s defence and aviation technology ecosystem at a time when the country is investing heavily in domestic capability.

HAVELSAN already supplies simulators to major domestic carriers like Turkish Airlines and SunExpress, and supports national aerospace platforms including HÜRJET, HÜRKUŞ, KAAN and GÖKBEY. With more than four decades in the industry and a backlog that will push its delivery count past 400 units across 60-plus military and civil platforms, the company’s track record gives the ambition real weight.

This new chapter in flight simulator production is more than a construction project it’s a signal that Türkiye is serious about owning a larger piece of one of aviation’s most technically demanding sectors.

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