A Framework to support aerospace knowledge transfer to developing countries via collaborative projects

There are economic, strategic and technological needs for establishing a national aerospace sector in many developing countries. This is to support the growing demands for aerospace related products and to encourage international collaborations. International collaboration projects can cost billions of US dollars, but provide opportunities to access and gain aerospace knowledge in terms of skills, technologies and infrastructure related to the purchased aerospace systems. While there are several options for international technology transfer, there are currently no effective approaches, specifically in aerospace knowledge transfer, for international collaboration projects between developed and developing countries. There is a need for a specific framework to guide developing countries in this task and to overcome different transfer challenges. This paper presents an aerospace knowledge transfer framework (Aero-KT) to effectively manage knowledge transfer into developing countries during international aerospace collaboration projects.