Gas

Howmet Aerospace is a manufacturer of advanced engineered solutions for aerospace and transport.

Howmet operates across four segments: Engine Products (airfoils and seamless rolled rings for aircraft engines and industrial gas turbines), Fastening Systems (aerospace fasteners, latches, bearings), Engineered Structures (titanium forgings and aluminium structures for airframes and landing gear), and Forged Wheels (aluminium wheels for heavy trucks).

The Engine Products segment is the strategic core: Howmet is one of only four or five companies globally capable of producing single-crystal turbine blades to aerospace specification, and together with PCC holds an estimated ~80% of that market.

The casting process — growing a turbine blade from a single crystal of nickel superalloy — prevents grain-boundary cracking under extreme heat and stress, and requires proprietary foundry technology with over 1,170 patents.

The commercial aerospace backlog (driven by record airline order books at Boeing and Airbus) extends through the decade. Data centre growth is an additional demand driver via industrial gas turbine and aeroderivative engine demand.

Precision Castparts Corp is a manufacturer of large, complex structural investment castings, airfoil castings, and forged components, serving the aerospace, industrial gas turbine, defence, and power generation industries.

PCC is the global market leader in single-crystal turbine blade casting — the most demanding form of precision metalwork, requiring proprietary alloy development and decades of foundry expertise to replicate. Its subsidiary PCC Airfoils is the leading supplier of airfoil castings to the industrial gas turbine market.

Beyond casting, PCC operates vertically integrated manufacturing spanning nickel superalloys, titanium sponge aerostructures, and aerospace fasteners.

PCC has a near-duopoly with Howmet Aerospace over high-end investment casting, together estimated to hold ~80% of the global single-crystal turbine blade market.

The company was acquired by Berkshire Hathaway in January 2016 for $37.2 billion — at the time Berkshire's largest-ever acquisition. In March 2026 it acquired UK-based Morvern Group, its first confirmed deal since the Berkshire acquisition, deepening turbine casting capability in European aerospace and defence supply chains.

PCC went public on the NYSE in 1968; Warren Buffett / Berkshire Hathaway acquired it in January 2016.