AECOM to pursue growth in UK Space Industry

With over 50 years of experience in the design, build and operations (DBO) of commercial and government space launch facilities, the supporting infrastructure and supply chain development -global infrastructure services firm AECOM congratulates the United Kingdom’s Space Agency (UKSA) on its recent spaceflight announcement.

Since the inception of the UKSA programme AECOM has provided potential sites with environmental, masterplanning and regulatory support. We now look forward to the next stage of this exciting programme and the opportunities it may present.

Drawing upon our experiences and lessons learned from operations at notable sites such as the Kennedy Space Center, we are excited to bring our global expertise to the UK’s emerging commercial spaceflight sector, developing a UK capability and skills base to support its growth. We are committed to leveraging and supporting the re-skilling of resources from our operation of the Dounreay Nuclear facility to ensure a trained and capable workforce is available to support space launch capability and growth in the supply chain.

In addition, AECOM is today (Wednesday 18th July) announcing that it is assigning Doug Johnson, AECOM’s Vice President, Aerospace Enterprise Services, as the focal point for AECOM’s engagement with the newly proposed space launch facilities, the UK space industry supply chain, and launch providers. Doug is a space infrastructure operations expert with over 31 years of space marketing experience.

Dave Swindle, AECOM’s Chief Executive for Global Defence and International, said: “This is a very exciting time for the UK space sector and we admire the UK Government’s ambition and the approach it’s taking in creating a new commercial market. It builds on the UK’s heritage in aerospace and space technologies and its ability to attract international interest and investment to its leading industries. AECOM has been involved in the success of the United States’ space programme since its beginning and as a major corporation already working in this region, we are committed to bringing together our best resources to help maximise the success of this bold new programme for the UK.

“The establishment of this first vertical launch facility and the additional commitment to horizontal launch facilities at Prestwick and Newquay is a significant milestone and AECOM looks forward to being a part of the growing and profitable spaceflight industry in the United Kingdom.”