British Aircraft Corporation - History

History

BAC was formed following a warning from government that it expected consolidation in the aircraft, guided weapons and engine industries. The government also promised incentives for such a move, including the supersonic BAC TSR-2 strike aircraft contract, the maintenance of government research and development spending and the guarantee of aid in launching "promising new types of civil aircraft".

The new corporation was jointly owned by Vickers, English Electric and Bristol. Internally it had two divisions - the Aircraft Division under Sir George Edwards and the Guided Weapons Division under Viscount Caldecote. The aircraft operations of the three parents were now subsidiaries of BAC; "Bristol Aircraft Ltd", "English Electric Aviation Ltd" 9with Viscount Caldecote as General Manager) and "Vickers-Armstrongs (Aircraft) Ltd" (under Sir George Edwards). BAC also had a controlling interest in Hunting Aircraft. The parents still had significant aviation interests outside BAC. English Electric had Napier & Son aero-engines, Bristol had 50% of Bristol Aerojet and Bristol Siddeley engines and smaller investments in Westland and Short Brothers & Harland.

When BAC was formed, the Bristol Aeroplane Company (Car Division) was not included in the consolidation, but carved off by Sir George White whose family had founded the British and Colonial Aeroplane Company in 1910 (later the Bristol Aeroplane Company). It remains operational today as Bristol Cars.

Most of the BAC designs were taken over from the individual companies that formed it. BAC did not apply its new identity retrospectively, hence the VC10 remained the Vickers VC10. Instead the company applied its name to marketing initiatives, the VC10 advertising carried the name "Vickers-Armstrongs (Aircraft) Limited, a member company of the British Aircraft Corporation". The first model to bear the BAC name was the BAC One-Eleven (BAC 1-11), a Hunting Aircraft study, in 1961. Bristol had eschewed the subsonic airliner market and was working on the Bristol 223 supersonic transport, which was eventually merged with similar efforts at Sud Aviation to create the Anglo-French Concorde venture. The first Concorde contracts were signed with Air France and BOAC in September 1972.

In 1963, BAC acquired the previously autonomous guided weapons divisions of English Electric and Bristol to form a new subsidiary, British Aircraft Corporation (Guided Weapons). The company enjoyed some success, including development of the Rapier, Sea Skua and Sea Wolf missiles. BAC eventually expanded this division to include electronics and space systems and, in 1966, started what was to become a particularly fruitful relationship with Hughes Aircraft. Hughes awarded major contracts to BAC, including sub-systems for Intelsat satellites.

The cancellation of the TSR-2 in April 1965 was a major blow to the new company. After successfully flying the prototype aircraft, political pressure forced development to cease and the remaining airframes and most supporting equipment and documentation to be destroyed. Given the numerous government contract cancellations during the 1960s, the BAC 1-11, launched as a private venture, probably saved the company.

In May 1966, BAC and Breguet formed SEPECAT, a joint company to manage the Jaguar aircraft programme. The first of eight prototypes flew on September 8, 1968 and service entry was achieved with the French Air Force in 1973, by which time Breguet had become part of Dassault Aviation.

Also in 1966, Rolls-Royce acquired Bristol Aeroplane for its Bristol Siddeley aero-engine business, but declared it had no interest in the BAC shareholding. Despite this, Rolls-Royce still had not disposed of its BAC shareholding by 1971 when Rolls-Royce was declared bankrupt. The 20% share was eventually acquired from receivership by Vickers and GEC, who had acquired English Electric in 1968.

In 1967, the British, French and German governments agreed to start development of the 300-seat Airbus A300. BAC argued against the proposal in favour of their BAC Three-Eleven project, intended as a large wide-bodied airliner like the Airbus A300, Douglas DC-10 and Lockheed TriStar. Like the One-Eleven, it would have carried two Rolls-Royce turbofan engines, mounted near the tail. The British national airline BEA wanted to order the type, but government intervention prevented it in favour of the Airbus development. BAC was refused development funds and Hawker Siddeley was awarded the contract to build the Airbus wings.