This summer, Moog Inc. will quadruple the size of its Colorado space vehicle production capacity, reports the online publication SpaceNews. The company is scheduled to integrate nine space vehicles in its new 95,000-square-foot facility in Arvada, Colorado, and its existing 32,000-square-foot plant nearby.
“It’s a proud moment for our company,” Maureen Athoe, Moog Space and Defense Group president, told SpaceNews. “This step takes us to the mission level. We’re going to hear from our customers about what they need not just with components, but with the actual mission.”
“If customers would like to buy components, we’re happy to sell them,” Hallie Freeman, Moog Integrated Space Vehicles business unit director and site manager, said at the Space Symposium, reports SpaceNews. “If they want to buy integrated subsystems, we’re happy to provide that. This gives us one more option for our customers who bring the payload and are looking for someone to be the integrated bus provider.”
Moog, based in New York, held a ribbon-cutting ceremony and grand opening in April for the Arvada facility. SpaceNews reports the company is moving employees and components into the plant in preparation to begin production this summer.
After decades of producing components and subsystems, Moog began selling entire small and medium spacecraft buses in 2018. Moog also offers a propulsive version of the company’s popular ESPA secondary payload ring and a Small Launch Orbital Maneuvering Vehicle.
Moog won its first contract to supply its Small Launch Orbital Maneuvering Vehicle to a government customer that plans to launch it from the United Kingdom’s Sutherland, Scotland, launch site.
Moog, a firm well known for providing spacecraft avionics, flight software and propulsion systems, relies on its supply chain for guidance, navigation and control sensors and the other components the firm does not produce internally, reports SpaceNews.