A New Chapter at GAES: Welcoming Rachid Lakhdari as Our New Director General & Accountable Manager to Expand Widebody MRO Services and Strengthen Regional Leadership

Things are moving fast here at Gulf Aircraft & Engineering Services (GAES) (FZE), and we are incredibly excited to share some big leadership news as we grow our team and look toward the future. We are officially welcoming Rachid Lakhdari as our new Director General and Accountable Manager.

In our line of work, such responsible position isn’t just a title — it’s the person who carries the ultimate corporate and legal responsibility for ensuring that the organisation has the resources and systems needed to maintain safe operations and comply with applicable regulatory requirements. And honestly, we couldn’t find a better fit. Rachid is a true aircraft maintenance professional through and through, with over 35 years of real, hands-on hangar experience. He started his journey way back in 1990 with Royal Air Maroc, rising straight from aircraft technician to the executive offices. For over two decades, he personally certified line and base maintenance all the way up to the most complex heavy D-checks on everything from Boeing 737s, 747s, and 757s to Airbus A320s & A330s. With B1.1 and Category C aircraft maintenance qualifications and experience as Senior Manager Base Maintenance and Maintenance Director — Post Holder, Rachid brings deep engineering know-how to every single decision we make about safety and quality.

"It is a great honour to lead GAES and its professional team," says Rachid Lakhdari, Director General. "Our priorities are crystal clear: safety and quality in everything we do, on-time delivery for our customers, and the sustainable growth of our capabilities. My entire career has been in the MRO sector, and I know for a fact that a company's success is built by the hands of the people in our hangars. I look forward to working together to take GAES forward."

This new chapter opens at a time when the aviation industry is facing a severe global shortage of new widebody aircraft and qualified engineers. Against this backdrop, we are actively focusing on expanding our heavy maintenance services for the Boeing 747 and 777 widebody families, opening our doors to new operators, lessors, and aircraft owners from all over the world. At the same time, we value the trust of our existing customers and remain committed to strengthening these long-standing relationships. We are proud of our unique positioning here in the Gulf region, and we remain 100% dedicated and attentive to the needs of our local and regional operators. We continue to safeguard the narrowbody fleets of our partners, relying on our deep expertise in Boeing 737 and Airbus A320 aircraft right here at our home base in Sharjah.

All of our growth potential stands on a solid foundation of top-tier international maintenance organization approvals. We work in accordance with the requirements of maintenance organisation approvals issued by the GCAA (UAE), EASA (European Union), FAA (USA) and UK CAA (United Kingdom), and other aviation authorities. For us, direct certification by our local authorities (GCAA) is a vital strength — it means we guarantee a local "gold standard" of quality right where our clients need it most.

Looking ahead means taking care of the timely training of new generations of engineers and technicians, including local talent. It means anticipating operational challenges and threats for our customers maintaining aging widebody fleets, and finding timely solutions to the technical hurdles associated with them. It also means taking care of our environment. We are aggressively pushing forward with our "Go Green" sustainability goals. Following the launch of our solar-powered EV charging station last year, we plan to do even more to increase the energy efficiency of our heavy maintenance hangars, working hand-in-hand with our partners at the Sharjah Airport Authority.

Of course, managing a hangar complex is a team effort, and operational continuity is everything to us. We want to express our immense gratitude and give a sincere thanks to Andrejs Curilins, our former Director General. Andrejs remains a vital pillar of our executive leadership team, transitioning into a crucial and highly responsible position as our Quality and Compliance Director. In this role, he is spearheading the optimization of all our internal workflows, guiding GAES toward securing our formal EN 9110 quality management certification in the very near future.