Boeing launches secrets suit at Virgin Galactic over ‘mothership’ dispute
Space tourism company accused of refusing to destroy proprietary documents after business relationship ended | Boeing claims Virgin Galactic owes $25m for work on new jet carrier craft.
Boeing has accused Virgin Galactic of stealing proprietary information after enlisting its services for the creation of a new ‘mothership’ to aid its space tourism offering, and refusing to pay more than $25 million for work on the project.
On Friday (March 22), Boeing and its subsidiary Aurora Flight Services filed a complaint at the US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia against Virgin Galactic, alleging violation of trade secrets laws and breach of contract, and asking the court for a preliminary injunction.
The complaint relates to two sets of documents allegedly acquired by Virgin Galactic after it contracted Aurora in 2022 to help design a new jet carrier and launch vehicle for its space tourism business.
This ‘mothership’ would be an improvement on Virgin Galactic’s existing model and enable it to fly multiple commercial space flights a day, Boeing said.
During the collaboration between the companies, Aurora inadvertently disclosed mathematical equations used to design and model aircraft to Virgin Galactic, according to the complaint, and conditionally disclosed a set of test data.
These documents constituted trade secrets that were subject to an agreement requiring Virgin Galactic to return or destroy them if requested, Boeing said, which it had refused to do.
Virgin Galactic said in a statement that “we believe this lawsuit is wrong on the facts and the law, and we will vigorously defend ourselves in the appropriate forum”, Reuters reported.
‘Refused to pay for work’
The aerospace giant told the court that by May 2023, Aurora had performed the preliminary work it had agreed with Virgin Galactic, and told the company that the production of a new mothership would take longer, and be more expensive, than Virgin Galactic had hoped.
This “was not the answer Virgin Galactic wanted”, Boeing claimed, and said that since that time, the parties had not undertaken any additional work on the project together, and that Virgin Galactic had refused to pay Aurora more than $25 million for work already performed.
Furthermore, it had “refused to honour its contractual obligation to destroy the two sets of trade secrets at issue” and maintained that it was entitled to use the information in further development efforts, including with a new partner, the complaint alleged.
Boeing said that Virgin Galactic’s announcement to shareholders that it planned to release a new mothership in 2027 “demonstrates that if it has not yet misappropriated the equations by use or disclosure, it will do so imminently”.
Richard Branson founded Virgin Galactic in 2004, which offers tourists space flights aboard a vessel called Unity.
Unity is launched to suborbital space at an altitude of approximately 44,000ft from jet carrier Virgin Mothership Eve.
According to Boeing’s complaint, Eve has “structural, maintenance and reliability issues” that threaten Virgin Galactic’s business model and it has been trying to develop a replacement since before Unity’s first crew flight.
The case is Boeing and Aurora Flight Services v Virgin Galactic. Boeing is represented by Stephen Cowen, Brian Rabbitt and Megan Lacy Owen from Jones Day. Virgin Galactic is represented by Brett Williamson from O’Melveny & Myers.
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