Orbital Sciences Corporation

Orbital was founded and incorporated in 1982 by three friends who had met years earlier while students at Harvard Business School—David W. Thompson, Bruce Ferguson and Scott Webster. In 1985, Orbital procured its first contract for providing up to four Transfer Orbital Stage (TOS) vehicles to NASA. Initially, the company was primarily involved in the construction and launch of commercial and military satellites for communications and remote sensing as well as space science probes. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Orbital also began developing systems for use in the burgeoning market for such systems. With the acquisition of General Quality Technology in 1993, Orbital enhanced its presence in the defense market through rocket and missile propulsion systems and other military aerospace technologies