Aerion Corp., the company that has been working for more than a decade to bring a supersonic business jet to market, will receive technical and certification support from Airbus in its quest to fly the revolutionary would-be airplane before the decade is out.
For its trouble Airbus will receive access to Aerion’s proprietary natural laminar flow technology, which could be applied in the designs of future Airbus airliners.
Led by billionaire investor Robert Bass, Aerion for the last several years has sought to engage a certification and manufacturing partner for its proposed supersonic jet, the latest iteration of which is a three-engine design that would be capable of cruising at Mach 1.6 over oceans and sparsely populated regions and at high subsonic speeds over populated areas.
With a projected price tag of $100 million, Aerion predicts there will be no shortage of buyers for the jet, dubbed the AS2, certification of which is targeted for 2021.
While the full details of the collaboration have yet to be revealed, Aerion said its engineering staff will work alongside professionals from Airbus Group’s Space and Defense division at newly expanded offices in Reno, Nevada, where Aerion is based.
The Aerion AS2 was featured in our “Rising Stars: 5 Planes That Will Change Aviation” in our July issue.
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