Mojave Aerospace Ventures (MAV) is a company founded by

Paul Allen Paul Gardner Allen (January 21, 1953 – October 15, 2018) was an American business magnate, computer programmer, researcher, investor, and philanthropist. He co-founded Microsoft Corporation with childhood friend Bill Gates in 1975, which ...

and

Burt Rutan Elbert Leander "Burt" Rutan (; born June 17, 1943) is a retired American aerospace engineer and entrepreneur noted for his originality in designing light, strong, unusual-looking, and energy-efficient air and space craft. He designed the recor ...

to handle the commercial spinoffs from the Tier One project. It owns the

intellectual property Intellectual property (IP) is a category of property that includes intangible creations of the human intellect. There are many types of intellectual property, and some countries recognize more than others. The best-known types are patents, cop ...

arising from Tier One, and it is in turn owned by Allen (the majority shareholder) and Rutan's

Scaled Composites Scaled Composites (often called simply Scaled) is an American aerospace company founded by Burt Rutan and currently owned by Northrop Grumman. It is located at the Mojave Air and Space Port in Mojave, California, United States. Founded to deve ...

. In 2004, it signed a deal with

Virgin Galactic Virgin Galactic is an American spaceflight company founded by Richard Branson and his British Virgin Group retains an 11.9% stake through Virgin Investments Limited. It is headquartered in California, and operates from New Mexico. The compan ...

to develop the Virgin SpaceShip, a suborbital

spacecraft A spacecraft is a vehicle or machine designed to fly in outer space. A type of artificial satellite, spacecraft are used for a variety of purposes, including communications, Earth observation, meteorology, navigation, space colonization, p ...

, for

space tourism Space tourism is human space travel for recreational purposes. There are several different types of space tourism, including orbital, suborbital and lunar space tourism. During the period from 2001 to 2009, seven space tourists made eight s ...

Virgin Group Virgin Group Ltd. is a British multinational venture capital conglomerate founded by Richard Branson and Nik Powell in February 1970. Virgin Group's date of incorporation is listed as 1989 by the Companies House, who class it as a holding co ...

and Scaled Composites have subsequently formed a joint venture,

The Spaceship Company The Spaceship Company (TSC) is a British/American spacecraft manufacturing company that was founded by Burt Rutan and Richard Branson in mid-2005 and was jointly owned by Virgin Group (70%) and Scaled Composites (30%) until 2012 when Virgin Ga ...

, to manufacture the spacecraft.

Company

The structure of Mojave Aerospace Ventures appears to be the basis of the deal between Allen and Rutan for the funding of Tier One. The company owns all the intellectual property of the Tier One project, such as patents, and so controls commercial exploitation. Allen, the sole source of funding for Tier One, is the majority owner. Rutan, having developed the technology, owns a minority stake. This stands in contrast to the company more usually associated with Tier One,

, which, as of 2007, is owned by

Northrop Grumman Northrop Grumman Corporation is an American multinational aerospace and defense technology company. With 90,000 employees and an annual revenue in excess of $30 billion, it is one of the world's largest weapons manufacturers and military techn ...

.Northrop Grumman Buys Builder of SpaceShipOne
Brian Berger and Lon Rains, ''

SPACE.com Space.com is an online publication focused on space exploration, astronomy, skywatching and entertainment, with editorial teams based in the United States and United Kingdom. The website offers live coverage of space missions, astronomical discov ...

'', 2007-07-20, accessed 2010-03-08. MAV serves to separate Tier One spinoffs from Scaled. Mojave Aerospace Ventures is part of Allen's Vulcan Aerospace.

Tier One derivative applications

Virgin Galactic

On September 25, 2004 MAV agreed on a joint venture with Richard Branson's newly formed company

, to develop a suborbital

for the space tourism market. The initial plan is to build five Virgin SpaceShips, based on scaling up the Tier One

SpaceShipOne SpaceShipOne is an experimental air-launched rocket-powered aircraft with sub-orbital spaceflight capability at speeds of up to 3,000 ft/s (900 m/s, 3240 km/h), using a hybrid rocket motor. The design features a unique " feathering ...

(SS1) design, with White Knight One (WK1) similarly evolved. The spacecraft would be manufactured by

. The designs for the

Tier 1b Tier may refer to: Groupings * Organizational, a ranking relationship involving order in a collective and its subordinate components *Ranking, a relationship involving order between a set of observations or variables * Data center tiers, Telecom ...

customer suborbital spaceflight vehicles are referred to as

SpaceShipTwo The Scaled Composites Model 339 SpaceShipTwo (SS2) is an air-launched suborbital spaceplane type designed for space tourism. It is manufactured by The Spaceship Company, a California-based company owned by Virgin Galactic. SpaceShipTwo is ...

(SS2) and its carrier aircraft is White Knight Two (WK2). The system, a suborbital space tourist system. A further development of the technology, Tier Two and SpaceShipThree (SS3) was mooted. Either as, initially an orbital system, or, later, suborbital transcontinental/transoceanic transport. SS3 would eventually become into a further development of Tier 1b.

Stratolaunch Systems

A further application of the Tier One technology is for Allen's Stratolaunch Systems under Vulcan Aerospace with its Stratolaunch carrier aircraft '' Roc''.

References

External links

Scaled CompositesVulcan Inc.
{{Space tourism Scaled Composites Virgin Galactic Mojave Air and Space Port Private spaceflight companies