Gilbert-based aerospace company plans to expand in East Valley

PHOENIX — Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey and Chandler Mayor Jay Tibshaeny announced last week that Orbital ATK, a Gilbert-based aerospace defense and manufacturing company, will expand operations to a new Chandler campus.

Orbital ATK’s two new buildings will occupy 617,000 square feet on a 47-acre campus near Price Road and the Loop 202.

“This latest expansion of Orbital ATK’s Chandler operation is a testament to the quality of Arizona’s talent and the ideal operating environment our state provides for aerospace and defense industry leaders,” Ducey said in a release. 

“We are thrilled that Orbital ATK continues to grow in Arizona and we thank the company for this significant investment,” he said.

The facility will be used for the company’s launch vehicle operations, which boost small and medium payloads into orbit.

“The launch vehicles we design and manufacture here are instrumental in providing cargo to the crews on the International Space Station, space and earth science, and in defending the nation,” Rich Straka, vice president and general manager of Orbital ATK’s launch vehicles division, said.

The division began in the 1980s and has grown to employ nearly 1,600 people and the new campus will lead to additional job growth.

In 2017, the firm hired 250 employees and it planned to fill 200 more open positions and expand its Chandler workforce by another 50 employees over the next year and a half.

The news of the expansion came one week after NASA gave the company approval to build a new land surface mapping satellite that is scheduled to be launched in 2020.

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