Two companies end partnership with NASA

Two years ago, BRS Aerospace planned to create more than 30 jobs and invest more than $7 million in a former space shuttle facility it leased from NASA at Kennedy Space Center.

But less than a year later the Miami-based company was gone, and KSC’s Parachute Refurbishment Facility is now slated for demolition.

Minnesota-based PaR Systems similarly abandoned another former shuttle facility in April, a year after NASA had touted their partnership as a symbol of KSC’s transformation into a multi-user spaceport embracing new ways of doing business.

The two companies’ departures are hiccups in that transformation, showing that outside companies won’t necessarily stick around if business and economic conditions don’t meet expectations.

KSC says that’s to be expected and there’s nothing it could have done differently to keep the two companies from leaving.

“We are a multi-user spaceport, there is no ifs, ands or buts about that,” said Tom Engler, deputy director of KSC’s Center Planning and Development office. “Just like anything else, people are going to come and go. But this place is going to continue to thrive.”

Several other KSC partnerships are repurposing higher-profile facilities more critical to the center’s long-term success.

Examples include SpaceX’s 20-year-lease and renovation of launch pad 39A; Boeing’s plans to assemble commercial crew capsules in a former shuttle hangar; a military space plane program’s use of two other hangars; and Space Florida’s recent 30-year deal to take over operation of the shuttle runway.

Other than the runway, all of those deals are underpinned by major government contracts, including plans for SpaceX and Boeing to launch astronauts to the International Space Station.

Beyond those major processing, launch or landing facilities and the contracts supporting them, it’s unclear how much commercial opportunity lies in KSC’s aging former shuttle facilities.

In April of last year, a PaR Systems executive talked about “extremely exciting” opportunities at Hangar N, a more than 50-year-old NASA facility on Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, where it inspected materials for flaws using non-destructive technology.

At the media event celebrating the anniversary of the company signing a 15-year lease of the hangar, a manager said its access to non-destructive testing equipment developed for the shuttle program offered a “significant differentiating factor” over competitors.

And with PaR picking up the cost to operate and maintain that equipment while NASA was in between human spaceflight programs, KSC Director Bob Cabana said the company was helping to preserve a capability “critical to our future.”

By this April, PaR had terminated its lease, two years into it.

The company did work for NASA’s Orion exploration capsule program, but there apparently was not enough other business to justify the old hangar’s cost.

Fewer than 10 people worked in Hangar N. The two still employed by PaR now partner with Craig Technologies, which took over NASA’s former shuttle logistics depot in the city of Cape Canaveral.

“We were proud to be selected as a NASA commercial partner at the Kennedy Space Center where PaR supported Lockheed Martin’s Orion Program, while being on site at Hangar N for two years,” said John Pollock, president of Automation Solutions at PaR. “We continue to support NASA and other commercial needs in the most cost effective manner by sharing a facility and partnering with Craig Technologies just outside the gates of NASA.”

NASA is in the process of deciding whether it needs Hangar N, which houses a large X-ray cell that can’t easily be moved. It has asked the Air Force if it is interested in the hangar, but no decisions have been made.

In July 2013, the announcement that BRS would expand and base a parachute research and development program at KSC’s parachute facility, which was built in 1964, drew praise from Gov. Rick Scott and state and Brevard County economic development officials.

The 34 jobs BRS expected to create over three years were to have an average wage of more than $62,000.

Lynda Weatherman, president and CEO of the Economic Development Commission of Florida’s Space Coast, said that with the deal KSC “further establishes its standing as a viable commercial center.”

Weatherman recently confirmed that both BRS and PaR Systems did not receive any local incentive money prior to leaving KSC.

“Any company expanding into new markets or ventures will have their share of challenges — some will succeed and others may not. While we hope all succeed it is important to show companies at any stage of the business spectrum, that this community is here to encourage them to grow and prosper.”

BRS did not return a call seeking comment last week. The CEO at the time the KSC lease was signed is no longer with the company.

Engler said it both cases NASA reviewed the agreements and decided its partnership process was sound.

“If the company is viable, and their reason for coming out here meets the intent of what we’re doing here as a multi-user spaceport, then we welcome them with open arms,” he said. “If they choose after some period of time to change direction, then so be it.”

Contact Dean at 321-242-3668 or jdean@floridatoday.com. And follow on Twitter at @flatoday_jdean and on Facebook at facebook.com/jamesdeanspace.