The aerospace industry is riding a decade-long economic super-cycle. The industry’s defense segment, however, remains under strain.

The latest list of the Top 100 Aerospace Companies, compiled by Flight Global and PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP (“PwC”), has been released.

Aerospace industry financial data from 2014 underscores the obvious: this industry is riding a decade-long growth wave. Our analysis, compiled by the aerospace experts at PwC, shows that, barring a wobble during the darkest days of the financial crisis, makers of aircraft and their suppliers mostly sloughed off the downturn and then surged during an otherwise weak recovery. Indeed, aerospace can be said to be enjoying an economic super-cycle.

Defense sales growth, however, has been anemic in recent years:

Western defence budgets remain under strain, with minus signs generally prevailing in the majors’ growth column; UTC is the big outlier, but percentage-wise its growth in 2014 was just a third of what it managed in 2013. However, the coming year could mark a turn in fortune, at least for some. US players can probably expect another year of broad stasis while the election plays out, though Lockheed Martin will get a boost from its imminent acquisition of helicopter maker Sikorsky from UTC. In Europe, the UK is engaged in a defence and security priorities review, and has determined to maintain spending, as per NATO guidelines, at 2% of GDP.

Since an aerospace company’s website is one of its most important marketing assets, I ran each of the companies’ websites through Marketing Grader. This free tool analyzes a website based on the 3 pillars of inbound marketing: 1) getting found online, 2) converting visitors to leads, and 3) measuring effectiveness.

Marketing Grader is a “tough grader.” A score in the 80′s is very good (congratulations to Boeing, Raytheon, Saab and Garmin). And if your site’s score is low, there are a number of things that can be done to improve it in a relatively short period of time. In fact, when you run your own site through Marketing Grader, a comprehensive report is generated outlining how to improve your site’s marketing effectiveness.

One of the best things a defense contractor can do to improve their marketing effectiveness is to start a company blog. This post explains the benefits of blogging for defense contractors:

Why Defense Contractors Can’t Afford Not to Have a Blog

Social media is a marketing tactic that is getting increased adoption and usage by aerospace companies. Social media is enabling aerospace companies to increase awareness amongst key audiences, including potential employees. More importantly, per the study referenced in “15 Reasons Why More Aerospace & Defense CEOs are “Liking” Social Media,” it is just plain good for business.

Given the growing importance of Twitter to aerospace companies, I have included a link to each company’s Twitter account if I was able to locate one. I have also set up a list on Twitter of the companies on this Top 100 list which can be seen by clicking here or on the adjacent graphic. And, you can see the list’s real-time tweets at the bottom of this page.

Similarly, given the many benefits of having a LinkedIn company page, I have included links to each aerospace firm’s LinkedIn company page for those I was able to locate.

Now, on to the list.

The Top 100 was compiled by aerospace experts at PwC. The information used in preparing the report was obtained from company annual reports, public filings and other publicly available information.

 

Number	Company	Revenues	Marketing Grade
1	Boeing	$90.8 billion	83%
2	Airbus	$80.6 billion	58%
3	Lockheed Martin	$45.6 billion	79%
4	United Technologies	$36.2 billion	62%
5	General Electric	$24.0 billion	69%
6	Northrop Grumman	$24.0 billion	70%
7	Raytheon	$22.8 billion	87%
8	Safran	$18.3 billion	68%
9	Finmeccanica	$17.2 billion	43%
10	Rolls-Royce	$14.7 billion	61%
11	BAE Systems	$13.7 billion	59%
12	Honeywell	$11.9 billion	57%
13	Bombardier	$10.5 billion	61%
14	General Dynamics	$10.5 billion	59%
15	L-3	$10.1 billion	49%
16	Textron	$10.0 billion	51%
17	United Aircraft	$7.40 billion	N/A
18	Precision Castparts	$7.00 billion	43%
19	Mitsubishi Heavy Industries	$6.87 billion	40%
20	Spirit Aerosystems	$6.80 billion	38%
21	Thales	$6.65 billion	77%
22	Embraer	$6.29 billion	N/A
23	Alcoa	$5.60 billion	57%
24	Zodiac	$5.54 billion	70%
25	MTU Aero Engines	$5.19 billion	46%
26	Rockwell Collins	$4.98 billion	52%
27	Dassault Aviation	$4.88 billion	76%
28	AVIC	$4.18 billion	13%
29	IHI	$4.07 billion	40%
30	Triumph	$3.89 billion	40%
31	Israel Aerospace	$3.83 billion	40%
32	GKN	$3.67 billion	56%
33	Harris	$3.63 billion	55%
34	Kawasaki (KHI)	$2.88 billion	51%
35	Orbital ATK	$2.99 billion	58%
36	Hindustan Aeronautics	$2.91 billion	N/A
37	B/E Aerospace	$2.60 billion	46%
38	Elbit Systems	$2.58 billion	36%
39	Cobham	$2.50 billion	77%
40	Teledyne	$2.39 billion	46%
41	Transdigm	$2.37 billion	29%
42	Parker Hannifin	$2.24 billion	29%
43	Korea Aerospace	$2.20 billion	22%
44	Meggitt	$2.17 billion	49%
45	MDA	$2.10 billion	22%
46	CAE	$1.95 billion	57%
47	Eaton	$1.86 billion	61%
48	SAAB	$1.80 billion	82%
49	Exelis	$1.77 billion	49%
50	Irkut	$1.71 billion	N/A
51	MOOG	$1.69 billion	49%
52	Esterline	$1.64 billion	44%
53	ST Engineering	$1.64 billion	40%
54	Aerojet Rocketdyne	$1.60 billion	66%
55	Hexcel	$1.59 billion	48%
56	Liebherr	$1.55 billion	69%
57	Allegheny Technologies	$1.36 billion	38%
58	Fuji Heavy Industries	$1.35 billion	39%
59	Diehl Aerosystems	$1.29 billion	70%
60	Daher	$1.29 billion	52%
61	Pilatus	$1.28 billion	48%
62	RUAG	$1.14 billion	41%
63	Heico	$1.13 billion	41%
64	Cytec	$1.10 billion	61%
65	Woodward	$1.08 billion	52%
66	Lisi	$1.05 billion	31%
67	Fokker Technologies	$1.01 billion	74%
68	Turkish Aerospace	$1.0 billion	N/A
69	Ball Aerospace	$935 million	51%
70	Amphenol	$917 million	44%
71	Constellium	$885 million	75%
72	Senior	$884 million	45%
73	Latecoere	$881 million	33%
74	ITP	$863 million	39%
75	Magellan Aerospace	$761 million	46%
76	Aernnova	$734 million	N/A
77	Curtiss-Wright	$714 million	46%
78	FACC	$702 million	48%
79	Crane Aerospace	$696 million	55%
80	Kongsberg	$678 million	59%
81	Chemring	$664 million	45%
82	Indra	$663 million	59%
83	Ultra Electronics	$658 million	49%
84	Jamco	$643 million	22%
85	Kaman Aerospace	$633 million	52%
86	SKF	$621 million	51%
87	Ducommun	$608 million	51%
88	Marshall	$506 million	67%
89	Asco	$439 million	46%
90	Griffon Aerospace	$419 million	26%
91	Sonaca	$418 million	29%
92	LMI Aerospace	$388 million	38%
93	Garmin	$386 million	86%
94	Praxair	$368 million	51%
95	Heroux-Devtek	$331 million	37%
96	Martin-Baker	$326 million	52%
97	Elettronica	$319 million	16%
98	Doncasters	$293 million	60%
99	Figeac Aero	$281 million	39%
100	FLIR Systems	$271 million	57%

 

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Below, you can scroll through the latest real-time Tweets from the Top 100 Aerospace Companies.

Tweets from https://twitter.com/DouglasBurdett/lists/top-aerospace-companies

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Note: Website grades are based on running the above URLs through Marketing Grader in 4th Quarter, 2015. If a different URL should be used, please notify me and I will run another report and update the score. Similarly, if an adjustment should be made to the Twitter listing or LinkedIn Company page, please post a comment below or email me.