Rocketplane Limited, Inc.

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Rocketplane Limited, Inc.

Type	Private
Founded	2001
Headquarters	Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, USA
Key people	George D. French Jr., CEO, David Urie, VP/PM, John Herrington, VP/Flight Operations
Industry	Aerospace and defense
Products	Suborbital spacecraft Space systems
Employees	30 (as of 2005-12-01)
Slogan	"Beyond Earth, Beyond Imagination"
Website	www.rocketplane.com

Rocketplane Limited, Inc. is an aerospace design and development company headquartered in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, with facilities in Guthrie, Oklahoma and Burns Flat, Oklahoma. It is building and planning to operate the Rocketplane XP spaceplane for space tourism purposes with plans to fly in 2007. For a price of about US$200,000, passengers will be able to purchase one ticket for a seat on a suborbital flight, including 4 minutes of weightlessness, with an apogee of over 100 kilometers altitude.

1 History
2 Acquisition of Kistler Aerospace
3 External link
4 See also

[edit] History

Rocketplane Limited, Inc. was incorporated under the laws of the state of Oklahoma on 16 July 2001. The corporation’s founders envisioned building a rocketplane that would send passengers more than 330,000 feet (100 km) above the Earth. In 2004, Rocketplane was designated a Qualified Space Transportation Provider by the State of Oklahoma under the guidelines specified in SB 817. With this designation, the State of Oklahoma awarded to Rocketplane re-sellable tax credits which were used to initiate operations, develop facilities, and recruit the required engineering staff.

Rocketplane Limited, Inc. is not the same company as Pioneer Rocketplane. Pioneer still exists on paper, but is no longer operating. Rocketplane Limited owns the intellectual property of Pioneer, but none of the principals of Pioneer, including its founder, work for Rocketplane Limited at this time.

[edit] Acquisition of Kistler Aerospace

George French, CEO of Rocketplane, announced on 27 February 2006 that he was purchasing Kistler Aerospace for an undisclosed sum. Kistler Aerospace designed and began construction of the K-1, a fully reusable two-stage to orbit launcher, but filed for bankruptcy before the vehicle could be completed. French intends to use the K-1 to bid for commercial crew and cargo resupply contracts to the International Space Station under the NASA COTS (Commercial Orbital Transportation Services) program. This contract was awarded jointly to SpaceX and Rocketplane Kistler on 18 August 2006.