Richard Branson, founder of Virgin Group Ltd., said in an interview after the initial public offering (IPO) of Virgin Galactic Holdings Inc. on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York, USA, on Monday, October 28, 2019.
Michael Ngale | Bloomberg Getty Images
Boeing and Virgin Galactic have settled a lawsuit stemming from Boeing’s work on the Virgin Galactic space tourism “mothership,” according to a filing Thursday in Virginia federal court.
A docket entry in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia said the case had been settled following a settlement conference held earlier in the day.
Virgin Galactic’s attorney Brett Williamson and Boeing said in an email that the lawsuit was “satisfactorily resolved by agreement of the parties.”
The company did not provide further information about the settlement.
The parent jet carrier Virgin Galactic is sending a cruise ship into suborbital space. The company completed its first commercial flight last year.
Virgin signed a contract with Boeing’s Aurora Flight Sciences in 2022 to help design new aircraft carriers. Boeing later said the aircraft carrier would cost more and take longer than expected.
Boeing sued Virgin in March, accusing it of stealing trade secrets and refusing to pay a $25 million loan for Boeing work. The lawsuit says Virgin took proprietary information from Boeing including test data and mathematical equations.
Virgin countersued in California in April, claiming Boeing did “shoddy and incomplete work” on the plane. Virgin said it was seeking monetary compensation of at least “the difference between the $45.6 million paid by Virgin Galactic to Boeing and the actual value of Boeing’s lower performance.”
Virgin dismissed the California lawsuit in June and said it would pursue its claim in the Virginia case.
A jury trial is set to begin in December in the Virginia case.
The case is The Boeing Company and Aurora Flight Sciences Corp v. Virgin Galactic LLC, US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, No. 1:24-cv-00456.
