On Wednesday, Virgin Galactic, an aerospace and space travel company based in California, announced a partnership deal with Boeing Company affiliate Aurora Flight Sciences. The companies have been in talks for months and finally reached an agreement. As a result, building two aircrafts can now officially start.
With the next-generation mothership and rocket plane starting revenue-generating missions in 2025, the partnership is expected to cover the design and manufacturing of two motherships.
Virgin Galactic took to Twitter to extend its excitement for the partnership while elaborating on the ‘high hopes’ the merger brings, “The new vehicles will be an evolution, rather than a redesign, of our current mothership Eve, taking the existing model and making a production version designed for high-frequency commercial operations.” The company labeled the partnership as ideal.
Although the new generation aircrafts are anticipated to fly up to 200 launches per year, Virgin Galactic remains hopeful, saying the partnership can support its goal of 400 flights per year. This partnership is a big step up compared to the aircraft (VSS Unity and VSS Imagine) that Virgin Galactic already has in its fleet. These two aircrafts combine for under 40 launch times a year.
As the fleet continues to grow, both companies expressed nothing but excitement. Todd Citron, Boeing’s chief technology officer, vice president, and general manager of Boeing Research & Technology spoke hopefully when he said, “Today’s announcement expands our collaboration with Virgin Galactic to accelerate transformative aerospace technologies.”
