Why Is Airbus Selling the Factory That Built OneWeb?
Airbus is reviewing a sale of its Merritt Island plant after moving 440 OneWeb satellites to Toulouse. Who buys a two-a-day line that lost its customer?
Why Is Airbus Selling the Factory That Built OneWeb?
The Merritt Island plant turned out more than 600 satellites at two a day. Its next 440 will be built in Toulouse instead, and the Florida line is now under strategic review with a sale on the table. Sovereignty for one continent is a factory closure for the other.
600+
First-generation OneWeb satellites built at Merritt Island by the Airbus OneWeb Satellites joint venture, at a peak rate of two per day
440
Replacement OneWeb satellites Eutelsat has ordered from Airbus since December 2024, all to be built in Toulouse
200+
Employees in the US small-satellite business under review, with revenue of several hundred million dollars a year, per people cited by the Financial Times
€6.5B
Estimated annual revenue of the combined Airbus, Leonardo and Thales space company under Project Bromo, on 2024 figures
Airbus has opened a strategic review of its United States small-satellite manufacturing business, including a possible sale of the automated plant at Merritt Island, Florida, because it has moved production of the next generation of OneWeb satellites to Toulouse. The Financial Times reported the review on 29 August 2026 and Airbus confirmed it, while stressing that the process is separate from the planned combination of its European space activities with those of Leonardo and Thales. No decision has been made and no buyer has been named.
The business under review is the operation that grew out of Airbus OneWeb Satellites, the joint venture Airbus and OneWeb formed in 2016 to industrialize the mass production of low Earth orbit (LEO) broadband satellites. Per people familiar with the matter cited by the Financial Times, it employs more than 200 people and generates several hundred million dollars in annual revenue. The wider Airbus U.S. Space & Defense business, which spans military aircraft, helicopters and government services, is not part of the review.
What makes this more than a real estate story is the reason behind it. The factory was built for one customer’s cadence, and that customer’s next order went to France.
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- 02Why OneWeb production moved to France
- 03Where this fits in Project Bromo
- 04What a buyer would actually get
- 05What it says about sovereignty
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