By AP/KWMU
St. Louis, MO – Boeing said Tuesday it will sell its 8-year-old rocket engine subsidiary in a deal worth $700 million.
Boeing got Rocketdyne in 1996 when it bought the aerospace divisions of Rockwell International. The unit is being sold to United Technologies, the parent company of jet-engine maker Pratt and Whitney.
Rocketdyne supplied the main engines for the space shuttle in the 1980s and continues to make rocket booster engines. It has about 3,000 employees and has plants in California, Alabama, Mississippi and Florida.
Jim Albaugh, chief executive of Boeing's St. Louis-based defense unit, says Boeing will continue to contract with Rocketdyne once it becomes part of United Technologies.