Avionic Services, the Ofex-listed aeronautical facilities provider, is set to launch a new instrument landing system calibration service for airports throughout the UK.

The instrument landing system (ILS) calibration equipment, installed in a specially adapted Piper Navajo Chieftain aircraft, is the latest venture for the company which is head-quartered at Kingston, Surrey, but is now operating on a worldwide basis.

Nobles, the Edinburgh-based investment house which assisted Avionic Services with a £1 million-plus fund-raising effort earlier this year, is currently working with Avionic Services on developing further expansion opportunities.

The ILS project, which began testing during the middle of December, is expected to be licensed by the Civil Aviation Authority’s Safety Regulations Group in early 2001. When the £500,000-plus modified Chieftain receives its SRG licence, Avionics says it will be only the second company in the UK able to offer ILS calibration facilities to British airports.

Avionic’s ceo Gareth Rowe said: “This is a very specialised line of work. There are very few companies globally which can carry it out. Basically, what is involved is that all airports equipped with instrument landing systems – for use in fog and bad visibility weather – have to have them calibrated at least twice a year.

“The equipment on the Chieftain calibrates the ground-based equip-ment to ensure that it comes within statutory safety parameters.”

Avionic Services has four divisions catering for airport navigation, comm-unication, air traffic control systems and airfield ground lighting.

Last year, it turned over £1.6 million before expansion plans began in earnest. The company now reports £2 million worth of orders in the book and plans for further growth through expansion abroad and, possibly, by acquisition.

“We are doing work now in Africa and, to a large extent, in the former Soviet Union. We reckon that we’ve won and completed orders in every republic ending in ‘stan in the former Soviet Union! Sometimes it seems like we’re on the Silk Route to China,” said Rowe.

He added: “We are still growing organically and we are looking to go for a turnover of £3.5 million at the end of this financial year. There are a number of opportunities on the horizon and Nobles are helping us with them. We are also stepping up our international trading capability.

“In a Third World context, there’s a requirement to bring funding with you and Nobles, with their PFI expertise, are helping us on that front. We’re keen to continue expansion of the international dimension.”