Bahrain national carrier Gulf Air has entrusted maintenance of the APS5000 auxiliary power units (APU) equipping the airline's 10 new Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner aircraft to Air France Industries KLM Engineering & Maintenance (AFI E&M).
The long-term contract includes a guarantee covering APU replacement. The repair services will be provided by AFI KLM E&M subsidiary EPCOR.
Gulf Air will use AFI KLM E&M's predictive maintenance solution: Prognos for APU, which uses big data technologies to monitor the performance of APUs and predict faults, ultimately helping to rationalise maintenance work and avoid shop visits and excess costs for client airlines.
Krešimir Kucko, Gulf Air chief executive officer, said: "EPCOR's proven TAT and service quality performance observed in the framework of our A330 APU contract convinced us to extend our partnership to this new type of APU and we are pleased to continue our relationship with them as we prepare to welcome new aircraft into our fleet.
EPCOR managing director, Martijn de Vries added: "Our leadership position for APU maintenance, repair and predictive solutions means we can guarantee unrivalled reliability and experience for our clients. The renewed trust Gulf Air has honoured us with is most definitely a bonus for our development in a region with fast-growing MRO requirements.