Bet Shemesh Engines Ltd.

Bet Shemesh Engines was founded in May 1968 as a joint venture between Joseph Szydlowski, the French engine designer behind Turbomeca, and the State of Israel. Ownership moved through the state, Pratt and Whitney's Thames Holding, Ormat and Clal Industries before FIMI Opportunity Funds became the main shareholder in 2016. The parent, Bet Shemesh Engines Holdings (1997), has traded on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange since 1997. The group runs two sectors. The Engine Parts sector designs, develops and manufactures components for other companies' engines. The Engines sector overhauls whole engines and develops small ones of its own, and the two sectors share a workforce and a test infrastructure.

Engine parts work splits across three divisions and three sites. Manufacturing, at the lead plant in Bet Shemesh, machines large round parts such as disks and spacers and fabricates sheet metal parts including flame holders and turbine nozzles. Forging is run by Carmel Forge in Haifa, bought back from United Technologies in 2019, which produces turbine and compressor disc forgings, cases and seals through closed die and ring rolling methods. Casting sits with Livnica Preciznih Odlivaka in Ada, Serbia, acquired in 2003, which handles vacuum and air melt of superalloys and investment casting of turbine blades and vanes. Pratt and Whitney, GE Aviation and MTU Aero Engines are long standing customers, and the company has been a risk and revenue sharing partner on the PW307 that powers the Dassault Falcon since 2004.

The MRO division repairs and overhauls complete engines, modules, components and accessories, and most part repairs are done in house using machining, shot peening, heat treatment and welding. Civil work includes field service for aircraft and helicopters powered by the Rolls-Royce M250 and the Pratt and Whitney Canada PT6, with test cells that handle thrust engines to 35,000 lb and turboshafts to 2,500 shaft horsepower. Military MRO grew out of decades of work for the Israeli Air Force, where much of the management and technical staff began their careers, and now serves the Royal Thai armed forces, the Colombian Army and Air Force, the Hellenic Navy, the Philippine Air Force and the Ecuadorian Air Force among others. Refurbished engines are also sold outright, and a company training centre feeds skilled machinists and engine technicians into a labour market that has very few of them. Research, development and engineering is the part that makes the company an original equipment manufacturer in its own right. It designs expendable turbojets for cruise missiles, anti-ship missiles and loitering munitions, a family running from the BS151 through the BS175 and BS175A at 196 lb of thrust to the larger Sorek 4 at 810 lb, alongside the BS-OZ, the BS-E4 turboalternator that puts out 60 kW of direct current power, and the BS-GEN 520 ground gas turbine genset rated at 520 kW for distributed and emergency power.