Aerion pulls the plug

Supersonic jet developer Aerion has announced it's closing down after it failed to raise enough funding to continue. The move is quite sudden as only two months ago the company announced it signed an agreement with NetJets for twenty AS2s and that they would work together on the development of the aircraft.

Aerion was founded in 2003 by a Texan billionaire. In 2004 it unveiled plans to launch the Aerion SBJ, a businessjet that would be able to fly up to twelve passengers over a distance of 7,400 km at a maximum speed of Mach 1.6. A single aircraft would have costed 80 million USD and the company booked 50 commitments for the aircraft.

By 2014, the company had invested more than 100 million USD on technical development when it announced that it was planning to redesign the aircraft. The AS2 was born, which would have a larger cabin and more range. The aircraft would have been powered by three GE Affinity turbofans, seated up to eleven passengers and could fly as far as 7,800 km at a maximum speed of Mach 1.4.

Aerion has over the years worked together with Airbus, NASA and Lockheed Martin on the development. However, in 2019, Boeing announced an investment in Aerion, with the aim to support the company with engineering, manufacturing and flight testing resources. According to Aerion, the company had 300 commitments for the new businessjet. It was also planning a larger AS3 supersonic jetliner later on.

Illustration by Aerion.