Toowoomba’s JRS Group to join Wellcamp defence, aerospace precinct and business park, creating up to 150 new jobs

This fast-growing Toowoomba company will play an essential role in unlocking Queensland’s lucrative aerospace and defence industry – all by providing one key service.

A homegrown manufacturing company will become crucial to unlocking Queensland’s burgeoning aerospace and defence industry, as it prepares to rapidly expand and create up to 150 new jobs.

Toowoomba’s JRS Group has revealed a triple-pronged expansion of its operations, with the business to set up shop in Wagner Corporation’s fast-growing defence and aerospace precinct next to Wellcamp Airport.

It will join global giants Boeing and Virgin Orbit in the precinct, with JRS to fill an essential cog in the massive supply chain that is Queensland’s growing defence sector.

JRS Group co-directors Jason and Jasmine Riddle outside the company's new manufacturing facility at Wellcamp.

Co-director Jasmine Riddle said her company, which she founded with her husband Jason a decade ago, would provide the coating and treatment to air and spacecraft to ensure they can withstand the difficult conditions of Earth’s atmosphere.

This will include the parts used in Boeing’s new MQ-28 Ghost Bat drone, the first military aircraft to be built in Australia in more than 50 years.

She said JRS Group’s role was so crucial, the state’s entire industry depended on it.

“It’s an incredibly important part of Queensland’s manufacturing future and our work will be crucial to our supply chain’s future,” Ms Riddle said.

“It is undeliverable without this — (the aircraft) would not be done in Australia, it would be sent away.

“It’s a critical part of the process – it runs them through a chemical treatment process and then tests them to make sure they meet all those standards and delivers them to the customer for assembly.”

JRS Group will also expand its manufacturing operations by opening a new facility in the Wellcamp Business Park, also owned by Wagner Corporation.

The entire process will create between 120 and 150 new jobs across all arms of the business over the next five years – and extraordinary level of growth for a company with about 50 employees currently.

Ms Riddle said the company had also heavily invested in education and training through its JRS Skills Academy, citing a need to develop good employment pathways for advanced manufacturing to cater for industries like defence, aerospace and oil and gas.

“The intention is to continue to expand and create a space for the JRS Skills Academy (at Wellcamp) to work alongside the facility but also work with school-based apprentices and other training groups,” she said.

“It’s known as industry-led training partnerships, so it’s happening on-site and that means it’s a great place to learn and be engaged with the sector.”

Wagner Corporation director Denis Wagner welcomed JRS Group’s expansion, noting it certainly wouldn’t be the last tenant inside the defence and aerospace precinct.

“There will be a lot of unique manufacturers in that aerospace and defence precinct, it’s a new and burgeoning industry,” he said.

“They add another dimension to the precinct and we expect that there will be a large number of similar suppliers and manufacturers that will join it.

“We’re talking to lots of them right now.”

Originally published as Toowoomba’s JRS Group to join Wellcamp defence, aerospace precinct and business park, creating up to 150 new jobs