{"id":19238,"date":"2016-09-22T20:23:58","date_gmt":"2016-09-22T12:23:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/internal-email-paul-allens-top-space-exec-chuck-beames-leaving-vulcan-aerospace\/"},"modified":"2016-09-22T20:23:58","modified_gmt":"2016-09-22T12:23:58","slug":"internal-email-paul-allens-top-space-exec-chuck-beames-leaving-vulcan-aerospace","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/internal-email-paul-allens-top-space-exec-chuck-beames-leaving-vulcan-aerospace\/","title":{"rendered":"Internal email: Paul Allen\u2019s top space exec Chuck Beames leaving Vulcan Aerospace"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Chuck
Vulcan Aerospace\u2019s Chuck Beames talks about spaceflight during a 2014 panel discussion in Mojave, Calif., marking the 10th anniversary of SpaceShipOne\u2019s flights. (XPRIZE via YouTube)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Aerospace veteran Chuck Beames is leaving his post as president of Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen\u2019s spaceflight company, Vulcan Aerospace.<\/p>\n

Word of Beames\u2019 departure came from Allen in an internal email that was sent to Vulcan employees and obtained by GeekWire today. Allen said Jean Floyd, the CEO of Vulcan\u2019s Stratolaunch Systems, will expand his role to become Vulcan Aerospace\u2019s interim executive director as well.<\/p>\n

\"Jean
Jean Floyd (Via LinkedIn)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Beames served as executive director of Stratolaunch Systems as well as president of Vulcan Aerospace Corp.<\/p>\n

The shift comes as team members at Vulcan Aerospace and Stratolaunch, its subsidiary, are ramping up construction of what will be the world\u2019s biggest airplane in Mojave, Calif. The twin-fuselage jet is to serve as a flying platform for launching rockets into orbit.<\/p>\n

As of June, Stratolaunch said assembly of the plane is 76 percent complete. During a tour of the Mojave facilities, Beames told reporters that Allen wants to have Stratolaunch sending payloads to orbit by the end of the decade.<\/p>\n

\u201cCome hell or high water, you can be sure that we\u2019re going to do that,\u201d Beames said in June.<\/p>\n

\"Paul
Paul Allen.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Today Allen suggested that Beames\u2019 departure is related to Stratolaunch\u2019s anticipated shift to its operational phase.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith this change, Chuck Beames has decided that now is the right time to leave Vulcan Aerospace,\u201d Allen wrote in the email. \u201cI am supportive of Chuck\u2019s decision and thank him for his commitment and stewardship these past two years.\u201d<\/p>\n

There was no word as to Beames\u2019 future plans. Efforts to contact Beames were unsuccessful.<\/p>\n

Beames came to Vulcan Aerospace in 2014 from the Defense Department, where he spent nearly 30 years in a variety of assignments relating to space and intelligence systems.<\/p>\n

Floyd joined Stratolaunch a year ago after serving as vice president and general manager for the civil and defense division at Orbital ATK.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=3QULQcKqrbU<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Tellingly, Allen called Orbital ATK \u201ca valued partner\u201d in his email. At one time, Orbital was slated to provide rockets for Stratolaunch, but that partnership has been in limbo for the past year.<\/p>\n

Vulcan Aerospace isn\u2019t the only spaceflight company in the Seattle area that\u2019s reshaping its executive team. This month, Clay Mowry left his longtime position as president of Arianespace Inc., the European launch company\u2019s U.S. subsidiary, to work for Amazon billionaire Jeff Bezos\u2019 Blue Origin space venture.<\/p>\n

Mowry\u2019s updated LinkedIn profile says he\u2019s in charge of global sales, marketing and customer experience activities for Blue Origin, which has its headquarters in Kent, south of Seattle. The new president of Arianespace Inc. is Wiener Kernisan.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s the full text of today\u2019s email from Paul Allen:<\/p>\n

\n

All,<\/p>\n

Over the last two years we have made significant progress in our quest to open up access to space. I am grateful for the rigor and hard work that our Aerospace team has brought to this effort.<\/p>\n

Now that we\u2019re closer to realizing our vision for convenient and affordable access to low Earth orbit (LEO) and moving into a more operational phase of our program, we are making some changes to our leadership.<\/p>\n

First, I am pleased to announce that we are expanding Jean Floyd\u2019s role. Moving forward, Jean will lead Vulcan Aerospace as Interim Executive Director while continuing in his role as CEO of Stratolaunch Systems.<\/p>\n

Jean joined Stratolaunch in 2015 after 25 years with Orbital ATK, a valued partner of Vulcan Aerospace. He is a seasoned aerospace professional who has experience leading air-launched space vehicle development, launch operations, and spacecraft programs. I am confident he brings the vision and expertise needed to lead us during this next phase of Vulcan Aerospace\u2019s development.<\/p>\n

With this change, Chuck Beames has decided that now is the right time to leave Vulcan Aerospace.  I am supportive of Chuck\u2019s decision and thank him for his commitment and stewardship these past two years.<\/p>\n

Chuck and Jean have informed the team and are working to ensure a smooth transition. Please share this news with your teams as relevant.<\/p>\n

Space remains the next great frontier and I believe Vulcan Aerospace is well-positioned to unlock affordable access to LEO. I am extremely proud of all this team has accomplished and I look forward to the realization of our efforts as we near completion of the Stratolaunch carrier aircraft.<\/p>\n

Thanks,
\nPaul<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Vulcan Aerospace\u2019s Chuck Beames talks about spaceflight during a 2014 panel discussion in Mojave, Calif., marking the 10th anniversary of SpaceShipOne\u2019s flights. (XPRIZE via YouTube) Aerospace veteran Chuck Beames is leaving his post as president of Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen\u2019s spaceflight company, Vulcan Aerospace. Word of Beames\u2019 departure came from Allen in an internal email […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[5191,291,5507,2672,2489,4396,4949],"class_list":["post-19238","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-chuck-beames","tag-commercial-space","tag-jean-floyd","tag-paul-allen","tag-stratolaunch","tag-tech-moves","tag-vulcan-aerospace"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19238"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19238"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19238\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19238"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19238"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19238"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}