Aircraft industry of Serbia

Originally, only the parts produced in foreign factories were assembled, but very soon the production of domestic components began, so as the engineering.

The forerunner of the domestic aircraft industry was the Airplane workshop (Aeroplanska radionica), which was established in 1920, at the airfield in Novi Sad.

A major boost to the industry was a decision by the state from 1926 to acquire over 800 fighters and several hundreds of trainers and school planes.

The advance of the industry was halted in 1932 when the state stopped with the further acquirement of the aircraft due to the Great Depression.

He founded Ikarus together with brothers Dušan and Milivoj Kovačević and engineer Josip Mikl [sr].

[1] In 1927-28 Ikarus built new facilities in Zemun, equipped for the serial production of airplanes and its own airfield.

[1] Some of the best aircraft produced in the factory include observation plane Potez XV, light bomber Bristol Blenheim and fighters Hawker Fury and Ikarus IK-2.

In 1954 the company began producing buses and, starting from 1960, the production of aircraft was being shut down and relocated to the SOKO factory in Mostar, Bosnia and Herzegovina.

The facilities were completely demolished and the area is today occupied by the residential buildings, stretching between the Hotel Jugoslavija on the east, and Palmira Toljatija Street (roughly blocks 9-A and 11-C. divided between the municipalities of Zemun and New Belgrade).

[5] In 2018 Citizen protested, demolished the construction hoarding and physically prevented the investor to destroy the building, so police intervened.

[6] Investor then posted a board which showed that the original building will be preserved but vastly expanded and superstructured.

[1] The factory was located in the neighborhood of Palilula, bounded by the streets of Stanoja Glavaša, Dalmatinska, Starine Novaka and Kneza Danila.

The new Communist authorities nationalized the company, merged it into Ikarus in 1946, while the facilities were transformed into the IKL (ball bearing factory) in 1948.

[2] In 1924 the Air Force decided to build an aircraft factory for its own needs, deep inside the state's territory.

Production was revitalized in 1939 when the State airplane factory (DFA, Državna fabrika aviona) was founded.

As the factory was damaged during the war, it was rebuilt in the 1944-46 period and with Ikarus, to which Zmaj and Rogožanski were attached, became the main force in the aircraft industry.

In 2017 the state-owned company Yugoimport SDPR, which deals with the arms and the defense-related equipment, took over 96% of the shares of Utva-Lola.

As of August 2018, representatives of the company's trade union claimed that the factory "is not capable of producing aircraft anymore".

[19] The company was founded by Nestor Slepčev, who originally designed aircraft in Australia, but after 1999 moved the production to Čenej, close to Novi Sad.

It is a two-seated plane, made of chromium and molybdenum, and produced in three versions, one of which is a four-seated and the other can land on the water.

[13][21][22] In 2013 the company produced its own design, the Aero East Europe Sila ultra-light aircraft.

[1] Đorđe M. Popović (1907–56), used his family owned furniture company in Užice to build gliders during the Interbellum.

[1] "Arsi Aviation", founded by Aleksandar Arsić (1953-2023) and seated in Belgrade's neighborhood of Višnjica, obtained rights to produce Swedish high performance carbon fiber ultralight aircraft Esqual in 2007.

[27][28][29] The "IAM" and "Vlajković-Walter" factories produced airplane engines and both were located in the Belgrade's industrialized suburb of Rakovica.

[31][32] Aircraft engines factory "S.Vlajković and Sons" originated as the carpentry workshop in 1925, founded by Svetozar Vlajković.

[34] Another producer of the aircraft instruments was the optics and precision mechanics company "Mikron", in the Belgrade's neighborhood of Krunski Venac.

In 1947 it was annexed to the "Nikola Tesla elektronska industrija" factory which switched to the production of the home appliances.

The company was divided in several parts which mostly went bankrupt, but "Kluz padobrani", which handled the parachutes production was privatized in 2006.

It was a research and developing institute, connected with the flight department of the School of Mechanical Engineering in Belgrade, but administered by the Yugoslav army.

[2] In 2013 it was given a task of reconstructing and upgrading aircraft platforms and parking spaces of the Belgrade Nikola Tesla Airport.