During a wide-ranging interview last week with Aurora Flight Sciences chief executive officer and founder John Langford, a single question set off a long and provocative monologue by the MIT-trained aerodynamicist and UAV pioneer that ripped into the heart of the ongoing debate about how the Department of Defense streamlines and reforms the industrial base.
My question concerned, of all things, retracing Aurora's role in the competition for the contract to build the X-55 advanced composite cargo aircraft (ACCA).
For Aurora, ACCA meant far more than an experiment in manufacturing all-composite airframes. It was a chance to leap into the ranks of aerospace "prime" manufacturers. If European-based aircraft-makers like EADS North America and Alenia North America could elbow aside major US primes during the last few years, why couldn't a homegrown start-up with a good reputation?
As I learned, however, the ACCA competition proved a bitter experience for Aurora.
"We were disappointed, although I can't say totally stunned, when they picked Lockheed over us [to build the aircraft]," Langford says. "But we were blown away when [Lockheed] then just blew through the design -- what we thought were the requirements -- and everybody still acted happy about it."
In Langford's view, the story offers a case study of today's defense industrial base.
"I tell that story because it goes right to the bigger picture of how does the US actually do innovation in the defense business," Langford told me. "I'm not saying that they should have picked Aurora. But I'm saying it's a problem if you can't move innovative new companies into the space because they always get kicked out in favor of the safe choice."
My transcript of Langford's version of the ACCA story is on the jump. As a postscript, I've also added a response from Lockheed Martin's Skunk Works, which won the contract.
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