Korea Aerospace Industries Makes Verticon Debut Eyeing Surion Interest

ATLANTA—Korea Aerospace Industries (KAI) has made its debut appearance at Verticon here as it seeks new sales opportunities for its KUH-1 Surion utility helicopter.

KAI is sharing a stand with Australia’s United Aero Group (UAG)—a maintenance, repair and overhaul organization that signed a memorandum of understanding with KAI at Seoul’s Aerospace & Defense Exhibition last year. The pact is exploring how United Aero Group can support KAI’s efforts to sell its rotary-wing platforms beyond South Korea, although the companies have yet to define the geographical scope of the agreement. Signing of the agreement follows UAG’s purchase of two of just four KAI Light Civil Helicopters (LCH) produced.

The LCH is a KAI-built derivative of the Airbus EC155, the type certificate and intellectual property of which was transferred to KAI in the mid-2010s.

KAI has since adapted the aircraft for a military role as the Light Armed Helicopter, which is being introduced into Republic of Korea Armed Forces service.

The primary focus for the pact, however, is potential sales of the Surion, which—according to Simon Williams, UAG’s head of global programs and technical sales—could be a strong contender for applications in the para-public market. The helicopter is certified in South Korea, and the two companies say there are opportunities for the aircraft to operate under a restricted category for some mission segments internationally. Several firefighting versions of the Surion, known as the KUH-1IQFS, have already been sold to Iraq for aerial firefighting duties there.