With the acquisition of Denver-based C&C Manufacturing, Boulder-based Special Aerospace Services (SAS) will add specialized production capabilities to its arsenal, which it soon hopes to apply to the realm of human spaceflight.
SAS counts Colorado aerospace heavyweights United Launch Alliance, Sierra Nevada Space Systems and Lockheed Martin — all of which work on projects that will take humans to space — among their top clients.
And, company co-founder Tim Bulk said, once SAS is certified by NASA to make parts for human-rated spacecraft, the possibilities are endless.
“We know the clients, we know the needs, and now we can help support those specialty needs,” said Bulk, who is married to SAS co-founder and CEO Heather Bulk. ” If they’ve got a part that they’ve been scouring the country for … if we can take and fit that into our run line and make that particular part and get it to them earlier so that the launch gets off on time, that’s big.”
A manufacturer that wants to produce parts for human-rated spacecraft must undergo an additional process to earn what’s called an AS9100 rating, the industry-recognized standard of quality and risk management.
C&C holds many of the necessary quality certification standards, giving SAS a jump-start on the process, which Heather Bulk says the company started March 24, the same day the C&C deal was signed.
She estimates it’s a matter of months before SAS gets the AS9100 stamp of approval.
The company is certified to make aerospace ground and test parts with additive manufacturing, which is the industrial form of 3D printing.
“This is really exciting and gives us more opportunity to branch out in a specialized way,” Heather Bulk said. “If we can meet the client’s needs on some specific part for mission success, that’s the role we want to be in.”
Heather and Tim Bulk formed SAS in 2007 from the basement of their home after realizing their combined expertise could prove valuable as the aerospace industry evolves.
Heather’s background is in financial planning, and Tim’s is in aerospace, with experience working for Lockheed Martin and NASA’s Johnson Space Center. Both are pilots.
They set out to fill a specialized niche in the aerospace industry, offering program management, mission assurance oversight and myriad engineering services to a client list that now boasts some Colorado-based industry heavyweights: Lockheed Martin, Sierra Nevada Space Systems, and United Launch Alliance, with which they are doing work on the recently announced Vulcan rocket and NASA’s Space Launch System.
Along with the help of former NASA deputy administrator Wayne Hale, who serves SAS as an adviser, the Bulks help clients navigate the red-tape-filled NASA spaceflight certification process.
“We do the system engineering piece, as it relates to human spaceflight,” Tim Bulk said. “So, it’s rolling up our sleeves, getting involved with the developers like ULA and helping them certify the vehicle.”
Companies like SAS are becoming more prevalent — and relevant — as the aerospace industry moves away from a vertically integrated structure, said Loren Thompson, chief operating officer of the Lexington Institute, a Washington, D.C., national security think tank.
To reduce costs and increase efficiency, many large companies are focusing on core competencies and bringing in outside help for other tasks.
“Every time the federal government creates a rule, that in turn generates work for somebody to help comply with the rule,” he said. “From the viewpoint of a Lockheed Martin or a ULA, they are mainly about building and operating launch vehicles and spacecraft. Compliance is something they’ve learned to do, but it does become a distraction to their core activities.”
Littleton-based Lockheed Martin Space Systems, which utilizes a robust supply chain of small businesses on almost every project, frequently works with SAS.
For NASA’s Orion mission, on which Lockheed Martin was the prime contractor, SAS brought niche skills to the table that proved critical to the mission’s success, said Al Simpson, Lockheed Martin senior manager of advanced programs in the company’s civil space division.
“Their specialized expertise in human spaceflight safety and advanced propulsion is a strong complement to our large-scale systems engineering focus,” he said. “On Orion, they ran a number of algorithms and analyses to help our team define the right safety specifications, engineer a system that would meet them and then test and evaluate performance along the way.”
Since acquiring C&C, SAS has made two hires. The company anticipates doubling the manufacturing plant’s workforce to 18 within 12 months.
However, hiring has brought new challenges.
“After starting this process — looking for, interviewing and hiring people — we determined … this is a critical skill set that is not readily available in Colorado,” Heather Bulk said. “We actually went to Detroit and Cleveland to start finding people.”
So, she says, they decided to do something about it.
SAS is talking training opportunities with a women’s veterans group. The Bulks also are hoping to team with Metropolitan State University’s new $60 million Aerospace and Engineering Sciences initiative to work with students learning the highly skilled art of aerospace manufacturing.
SAS overall has slightly less than 50 employees, 17 of whom are women and many of whom have exceeded expectations after given a “foot in the door” opportunity, Heather Bulk said.
However, she said, the fact that SAS is a woman-owned, 8(a)-certified disadvantaged business isn’t a factor when it comes to working relationships with clients.
“These large companies treat us like a partner. They don’t treat us as somebody who needs to be brought in for any sort of requirements — meaning that they’re forced to bring in a small company to meet those goals,” she said. “When they bring us in, it’s into the fold, and we’re teammates.”
Laura Keeney: 303-954-1337, lkeeney@denverpost.com or twitter.com/LauraKeeney
