Northern Ireland is competing with Spain and Poland to host one of two engine maintenance facilities that Ryanair plans to open in-house from 2029, a project that could create up to 600 jobs. A senior Stormont official has confirmed that Ryanair will be offered a 67 million pound public subsidy to locate the facility there.

Ryanair Holdings is headquartered in Dublin and listed on Euronext Dublin and the London Stock Exchange. For the year ended 31 March 2025, the group reported revenue of 13.95 billion euros and net profit of 1.61 billion euros.

The airline is planning to bring engine maintenance in-house at two facilities, reducing its reliance on third-party providers. The Belfast Telegraph reported that the Northern Ireland bid is for a hub worth around 400 million euros.

Growing engine maintenance demand is behind the plan, with the airline having around 200 engines in maintenance at any given time and that number expected to rise as its fleet expands. None of its existing engineering bases at Prestwick, Shannon, Wroclaw, Kaunas and Dublin currently overhaul engines in-house.

The bulk of the Northern Ireland offer is expected to come from the Northern Ireland Enhanced Investment Zone, a UK government-funded initiative designed to promote investment and productivity in manufacturing.

The contest runs alongside other Ryanair maintenance investment. The airline has received environmental authorisation for a 290 million euro engine centre at the Port of Seville, designed to overhaul up to 200 turbofan engines a year and create around 950 jobs, and it has indicated it will choose between Seville and a Polish alternative before the end of the year.

Ryanair has also confirmed a 40 million pound expansion of its Prestwick heavy maintenance base in Scotland, creating 450 jobs and making it the airline’s largest heavy maintenance hangar. It has separately secured planning approval for a 50 million euro, four-bay hangar and engineering academy at Shannon Airport.

For the sector, the contest shows how a single large low-cost carrier is shaping where European engine maintenance capacity is built as it brings overhaul work in-house.

Source: BBC / Belfast Telegraph / Travel Extra