ABSTRACT
This chapter explains the critical role of highly skilled labour as a basis for the innovation and competitiveness of islands of innovation in high technology industries using the example of the civil aerospace industry. It describes the structure of the industry’s supply chain and the firm-level competences required at different tiers of the supply chain and analyses the different types of highly skilled labour required by the industry. The chapter also explains the impacts of on-going market and technological changes on the structure of the supply chain and provides the varying impacts of these structural changes on the skills and labour supply needs of well established, and entrants into the aerospace supply chain. Engineering labour, with a wide variety of different types of expertise and education, is required throughout the supply chain and, as with manufacturing labour, a firm’s precise requirement for engineers depends on its particular niche within the supply chain.
