Spirit AeroSystems: Where Flight Begins

Spirit AeroSystems shares a rich history with its native home of Wichita, Kansas. During the barnstorming era of the 1920s and 1930s — often seen as the early years of aerospace design and innovation — aviation companies gravitated to Wichita, making it the startup hub of the industry. One of the early pioneers who came to town was Lloyd Stearman and his company, the Stearman Aircraft Company — predecessor to Spirit AeroSystems. Stearman’s young company got its initial success building cadet trainers for the Army Air Corps before eventually merging with Boeing Aircraft Company.

Spirit was officially founded in 2005 when Boeing Commercial Airplanes sold its Wichita Division and Oklahoma operations. The newly named Spirit AeroSystems, with a legacy 90 years in the making, quickly became the industry’s premier aerostructures manufacturer. Today, Spirit builds major components and critical aerostructures for commercial aerospace and defense aircraft, including major fuselage, propulsion and wing assemblies.

Delivering aviation innovation

Spirit’s strong foundation in research and development paired with the company’s dedication to innovative solutions has enabled them to continue to deliver advancements in commercial aviation and to the defense industry.

As a result, the company has been the driving force behind many aviation firsts on commercial aircraft. For example, Spirit was part of creating Boeing’s first all-composite aircraft. To achieve this pioneering effort, Spirit researched, designed and engineered a new composite manufacturing capability that differed from the existing, traditional metallic aircraft processes.

With this breakthrough in composites, Spirit was able to provide commercial and defense aircraft with new options that meant more structural strength without extra weight, resulting in improved fuel efficiency and overall aircraft performance.

While composites offer many benefits, they also required Spirit to rethink several stages of its manufacturing process. Leveraging Spirit’s engineering expertise, the company created ways to efficiently cure large aerostructures and tooling components and develop new methods for stress testing.

This is just one example of how Spirit goes beyond traditional thinking and building. Spirit recognizes the talent and ingenuity of its experienced and creative team and utilizes this knowledge base and drive to continue to push the aviation industry to new heights of performance. With each aircraft that Spirit supports, the team evaluates what can be done differently, and better — and then applies the manufacturing milestones achieved and lessons learned to future programs.

Mission ready

The defense aviation industry brings with it a unique set of opportunities, challenges and requirements. But one thing remains constant — the need for better, faster, safer and smarter products and solutions.

Spirit played a critical role in the early development of defense aircraft and has continued to stay on the leading edge to support U.S. military forces and allies with mission-ready aircraft designed to meet evolving demands and threats. Spirit’s status as the largest tier-one aerostructures manufacturer originates, in part, from its heritage of profound dedication and service to the defense industry, including building the original B-29 Superfortress, the B-47 Stratojet and the B-52 Stratofortress.

A key factor in Spirit successfully supporting defense customers is its in-depth understanding of what a mission demands of an aircraft. This is in part due to the fact that the Spirit leadership team shares a strong background in leading defense programs. Knowing the mission goals, what resources are available, what constraints are being faced and pairing this industry knowledge with technical expertise enables Spirit to help customers take off on the right foot, so to speak, before a mission even begins. 

Spirit has been a key aviation innovator supporting the U.S. Army, U.S. Navy, U.S. Marines and U.S. Air Force. The company’s ongoing drive for aviation excellence positions it for continued growth and success in the defense industry.

With its Wichita roots and the area’s rich aviation legacy, Spirit has evolved over the decades into a leading aerostructures company and a trusted partner for both commercial and defense customers. With its pioneering R&D work to deliver next-generation design, build and fabrication capabilities, Spirit will continue to make history by delivering innovations and best practices that will take aviation to new heights and will make our military strong for decades to come.