Spotlight: PBS Group

[00:00:00]Welcome to Aviation Week TV's coverage here at Farra 2026. We're here at the stand of PBS, which is a Czech company.

[00:00:06]It's been going for 200 years, but really focusing in the last 50 in the aerospace world on its product range of small turbo jet engines.

[00:00:17][music] Now, Stan Stanislav PBS, tell us a little bit about you and about your range of products. As you already mentioned, PBS uh has a long history. Uh the company is basically over 200 years old. But in the last 50 years, uh we concentrated uh on aerospace uh industry. Uh we started with APUs and ECS uh systems. uh last 25 years uh we actually introduced our family of turbo jet engines which is now booming as you can as you can say >> and applicationwise Stannislav just tell us a little bit about how it's been a civil world perhaps that you concentrated on was your most popular ranges up to about well let's just say the Ukraine war but how has that affected your business going forward >> well the Ukraine war changed it quite a bit um our engines were used mainly in in civilian applications but after the started. Uh you see that our engines go basically into into defense systems.

[00:01:19]>> Be more specific. Defense systems, missiles, drones.

[00:01:22]>> We're talking about drones. We're talking about uh guided missiles.

[00:01:25]>> And of course to ramp up that production, tell us how you've been, you know, working to cope with that to increase your capacity both in Europe in Czech Republic and also in uh the US. I believe >> if I can just compare the numbers of engines that we produced let's say back like four years and now uh the uh the race was just enormous it's nearly 800%.

[00:01:48]Of course we need to react in terms of uh supply chain but also the whole uh production capabilities uh our main customers are mainly in the US. [music] So we decided a couple of years ago to move to the United States to build another production facility there.

[00:02:05]>> And where is that and you know is that is that up and running now?

[00:02:09]>> It is up and running. Uh we open our facility [music] in in Roswell in in the state of Georgia now producing uh two types of engines. DJ40 which is the smallest one in here and DJ8.

[00:02:22]and let's tell us about you know your partnerships because obviously you're obviously PBS does you do your thing but you're also working with US aerospace manufacturers to increase your footprint and to increase your product range.

[00:02:34]>> Oh that's right. Um we uh we have a common project with Pratt and Whitney.

[00:02:40]Uh both companies are among only four companies in the world that produce APUs that are certified to use on on civilian aircraft. And now we're working on a new project called Next Generation NPU.

[00:02:51]Another cooperation that we have with Loit Martin. Uh there's there's a special part that we are trying to produce in a new way for uh for the F35.

[00:03:00]We are very proud of that cooperation.

[00:03:03]>> And where are you at with these in terms on on the APU and then on the F-35? Are these things which are going to see products rolling out in the next one, two, what's the sort of timeline, Stannislav? In terms of the new generation APU, uh we're talking about two or three years and uh the new product should be on the market. Uh with the F-35 program, that's another issue.

[00:03:22]We're trying to to produce a part in a new new way, which takes some time. You know, the program will probably go for another two or three years.

[00:03:31]>> And what is it that PBS, you know, what attracts, you know, these companies to PBS in your view?

[00:03:36]>> I think that's the level of R&D that we have inhouse. Um like if we're talking about uh auto budget engines basically 90% of of the parts we can produce in-house [music] you know with the uh with the big demand now we have to go and outsource you know set and things just to be able to meet all the requirements but I think that's the excellence that we have been in engineering and the long tradition. So you've got a big ramp up, you've got new products coming, you know, what else is there for PBS to do or is it or you're in an execution phase >> this year? We're opening a new aerospace division in our main production site at Vulca Bites. Also, we're looking elsewhere in the United States to have another facility just to meet uh the enormous uh demand that we have there for our engines.

[00:04:26]>> So that's an output, that's a capacity piece that's getting the volumes you want to deliver to customers. What about productwise? You've obviously got new products here. What are you really showing off here at Farmra?

[00:04:36]>> What I can show you here is a new uh turbo jet engine called DJ 200. Uh it's in the uh pre-production phase. Uh just trying to do some let's say [music] small changes uh for this engine to be produced in in in bigger numbers.

[00:04:51]>> And that's for for missiles mainly.

[00:04:53]>> That's going to be for missiles. Yes.

[00:04:55]>> And what about what else is your for PBS in the next 10 years? What are your ambitions Dannis Lab? Um [music] we would like to stay at the top you know in terms of the turbo jet engines production. Um as I said uh we spend and invest a lot of money in research and development. So there are new engines definitely coming.

[00:05:14]>> Thank you for talking to Aviation Week TV. For all Aviation Week TV's coverage, go to aviationweek.com.