![]() ![]() It has also gained new revenue streams from activities such as advanced composites for aircraft as diverse as the Global Hawk, Sikorsky’s CH-53 helicopter, and the Gulfstream G500 business jet, with manufacturing plants in West Virginia and Kentucky. “We still run at the speed of Aurora but benefit from the scale of Boeing to solve problems for customers.”ĭespite the troubles faced by his parent company, Beith said that the Boeing acquisition greatly expanded the scope of his company’s business model, getting it engaged in advanced air mobility. “We’re still at the front end of military research with the Air Force Research Lab and DARPA,” Beith explained. ![]() Today, these defense-related activities are still important to Aurora, as has been Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)-funded work such as the development of the XV-24A Lightning Strike tiltwing aircraft. It played a leading role in key military programs, such as the Global Hawk and MQ25 military drones, as well as groundbreaking developments for NASA, such as a demonstrator vehicle to prepare for a mission to Mars. The company, which has been rebuilding a balance sheet battered by the Covid crisis and the long-standing problems with its 737 Max airliner, said that Aurora would continue to be a subsidiary of the Boeing group.Īerospace engineering veteran John Langford formed Aurora Flight Sciences in 1989, and it quickly established a strong reputation as a hothouse for fast-tracking innovation for unmanned aerial systems. In September 2020, Boeing announced the closure of the Boeing NeXt unit, of which Aurora was a part, having been acquired by the aerospace giant in October 2017. “We may fly the PAV again or we could migrate its technology to other platforms,” Beith said. He said that these models are all still in the Aurora hangars and that work will be stepped up as new funding becomes available. “We built two vehicles and we were also working on a hybrid-electric version,” he told FutureFlight. ![]() Plans to resume this work have since been suspended indefinitely.Īccording to president and CEO Per Beith, the company’s Virginia-based engineering team is still working to apply the all-electric PAV’s technology to several other platforms that could use a mix of propulsion systems and varying degrees of autonomous flight capability. June 2 will mark the second anniversary of an accident in which its Passenger Air Vehicle (PAV) eVTOL technology demonstrator was badly damaged in a crash during flight testing. Aurora Flight Sciences is quietly developing its advanced air mobility technology, despite longer-term plans for this sector being somewhat in limbo due to budget cuts at Boeing, its parent company. ![]()
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