Boeing plans to open a production facility in Sheffield, England, to manufacture wing flap actuation systems for Boeing’s Next-Generation 737, 737 MAX and 777 aircraft.

The new facility, the result of a Boeing investment of more than £20m, is part of a broader plan by Boeing to begin in-house manufacturing of key actuation components and systems in the U.S. and the U.K. to enhance production efficiency and reduce cost in its supply chain.

The new U.K. facility, to be named Boeing Sheffield, will be Boeing’s first manufacturing facility in Europe, though the company already employs more than 2,000 people in teh U.K. Boeing Commercial Airplanes’ (BCA) facility in Portland, Oregon, U.S., will also produce actuators and assemble actuation systems for these models.

Boeing Sheffield will employ approximately 30 people when it opens as part of BCA’s fabrication operations and will work closely with Boeing Portland, a company Center of Excellence for complex machining, gear systems and flight controls.

Subject to local authority and other relevant planning permissions, the proposed 2,300-square-metre (25,000 square feet) Boeing Sheffield facility will be built alongside The University of Sheffield’s Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre with Boeing (AMRC), a machining and materials research campus founded in 2001 by Boeing and the University of Sheffield.

Boeing plans to initiate a major Research & Development programme with the AMRC to develop new manufacturing techniques that can be applied in the new Boeing Sheffield facility.