Darpa-Funded Heliplane Company in Nose Dive

Could it be curtains soon for a small company that dreams of building a gyroplane, a rotorcraft whose rotor "is driven by aerodynamic forces in autorotation"? In a press release, Groen Brothers, which is publicly traded and has received funding from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, announces that it is reducing "its employee work force by two-thirds, and is reducing other expenditures as well."

Groen Brothers has struggled for over a decade to raise money for its plane, which is a revival of a mid-century aviation concept. As Graham Warwick explains over at Aviation Week's ARES blog:

Groen's dream is to revive the gyrodyne concept made famous by the Fairey Rotodyne, a 44-seat convertiplane that flew in 1957, but was cancelled in 1962 (check out the video). In a gyrodyne, the rotor is powered for vertical take-off and landing and autorotates in forward flight, allowing the aircraft to fly faster than a conventional helicopter. The turboprop-powered Rotodyne exceeded 190mph - the turbofan-powered Heliplane is intended to reach 400mph.

At the end of last week, Groen Brother's stock was trading at six cents.