In March 1930, nine years prior to the creation of the bureau, Pavel Sukhoi, an aerospace engineer, took over team no. 4 of the CAHI's AGOS aviation, flying boat aviation and aircraft prototype engineering facility. Under Sukhoi's leadership, the team of the future design bureau started to take shape. The team, under the TupolevOKB, produced experimental fighters such as the I-3, I-14, and the DIP, a record-breaking RD aircraft, the Tupolev ANT-25, flown by famous Soviet aviators, Valery Chkalov and Mikhail Gromov, and the long-range bombers such as the Tupolev TB-1 and the Tupolev TB-3.[8]
In 1936, Joseph Stalin, leader of the Soviet Union, issued a requirement for a multi-role combat aircraft. As a result, Sukhoi and his team developed the BB-1, a reconnaissance aircraft and light bomber in 1937. The BB-1 was approved and under a July 29, 1939 government resolution, the Sukhoi OKB, designated as OKB-51, also known as the Sukhoi Design Bureau, was developed in order to set up production for the aircraft. The BB-1 was introduced and later adopted by the Soviet Air Forces in the same year. A year later, the BB-1 was later designated the Sukhoi Su-2. A total of 910 Su-2 aircraft were developed. The resolution also made Sukhoi chief designer, gave Sukhoi's team of the design bureau standalone status and relocation of the bureau to the Production Aircraft Plant No. 135 in Kharkov, Ukrainian SSR. However, Sukhoi was not satisfied with its location, since it was isolated from the scientific pole of Moscow. Sukhoi later relocated the bureau to the aerodrome of Podmoskovye in Moscow, completing half of the relocation by 1940. Sukhoi encountered another issue: the bureau had no production line in Moscow, thus making it useless as Sukhoi had nothing to do.[8]
World War II
During the German invasion of the Soviet Union in World War II, the Su-2 needed a successor as it was proved obsolete and under-armed against German aircraft, with 222 aircraft destroyed in total. Sukhoi and his bureau designed a two-seat armored ground-attack aircraft, the Sukhoi Su-6, considered in some terms to be superior to its competitor, the Ilyushin Il-2. The government, however later chose the Il-2 over the Su-6, but rewarded Sukhoi a Stalin Prize of the 1st Level for its development in 1943. Sukhoi and this team later focused on development of variants of the Su-2, the prototype cannon-armed Sukhoi Su-1 (Su-3) fighter, as well as the Sukhoi Su-8, which to serve as a long-range ground-attack aircraft for the Soviet Air Forces, but was later discarded as the Soviet Union was winning the Eastern Front.[8]
After the war, Sukhoi and his team were among the first Soviet aircraft designers who led the work on jet aircraft, creating several experimental jet fighters. Sukhoi started developing two mixed-power fighters, the Sukhoi Su-5 and a modification of the Sukhoi Su-6 named Su-7 before 1945. At the start of 1945, the design bureau started working on jet fighters such as the Sukhoi Su-9, Sukhoi Su-11, Sukhoi Su-15, and the Sukhoi Su-17, the Sukhoi Su-10jet bomber, and the reconnaissance and artillery spotter twinjet, the Sukhoi Su-12. Sukhoi and his team also used the Tupolev Tu-2 bomber to develop and produce the trainer bomber UTB-2, worked on passenger and troop-carrying aircraft, the jet fighter Sukhoi Su-14, and a number of other aircraft.
From 1945 to 1950, Sukhoi and his team also developed the Soviet Union's first booster aircraft control system, landing braking parachute, catapult ejection seat with telescopic trolley, and a jettisonable nose with a pressurized cockpit. From 1949, Sukhoi fell out of Stalin's favor and in a government resolution, the Sukhoi Design Bureau was scrapped, and Sukhoi was forced to return to work under Andrei Tupolev, this time as Deputy Chief Designer. In 1953, the year of Stalin's death, he was permitted to re-establish his own Sukhoi Design Bureau, set up with new production facilities.[8]
Contemporary era
Previous Sukhoi logo
After the collapse of the Soviet Union, each of the multitude of bureaus and factories producing Sukhoi components was privatized independently. In the early 1990s, Sukhoi started to diversify its products and initiated Sukhoi Civil Aircraft to create a line of civil aviation projects for the company. The progress made by the new branch would lead to the development of the utility aircraft, the Su-80, and the agricultural aircraft, the Su-38, less than a decade later.[9] In 1996, the government re-gathered the major part of them forming Sukhoi Aviation Military Industrial Combine (Sukhoi AIMC).[10] In parallel, other entities, including Ulan Ude factory, Tbilisi factory, Belarus and Ukraine factories, established alternate transnational Sukhoi Attack Aircraft (planning to produce e.g. Su-25 TM).[10]
As of January 2015, Sukhoi is working on a family of the regional airliner: the Sukhoi Superjet 100, such as the jet airliner Superjet 130, which would have a seating capacity of 130 to 145 seats, and to bridge the gap of Russian aircraft between the Superjet Stretch and the Irkut MC-21.
Integration of the Irkut Corporation and cease operation
At the end of November 2018, United Aircraft Corporation transferred SCAC from Sukhoi to the Irkut Corporation, to become UAC's airliner division, as Leonardo S.p.A. pulled out in early 2017 because of Superjet's poor financial performance.
Irkut will manage the Superjet 100, the MC-21 and the Russo-Chinese CR929 widebody, but the Il-114 passenger turboprop and modernized Ilyushin Il-96-400 widebody will stay with Ilyushin.
The new commercial division will also include the Yakovlev Design Bureau, avionics specialist UAC—Integration Center and composite manufacturer AeroComposit.[16]
Sukhoi Civil Aircraft Company (SCAC), a developer and manufacturer of SuperJet aircraft, ceased operations as an independent legal entity and became a branch of IRKUT Corporation, changing its name to Regional aircraft. This is stated on the company's website.
"Within the implementation of the strategy uniting civil aircraft companies into one Civil Aviation Division JSC “SCA” has been integrated into Irkut Corporation starting from February 17, 2020. The decision was adopted by JSC “SCA” Shareholders on June 27, 2019. Regional Aircraft – Branch of the Irkut Corporation shall resume the continuity of business in the areas of development, production and aftersales support of the aircraft," - it is stated on corporate website in the section "Company".[17][18]
In June 2023 patents for a new design of a single engine Su-75 stealth fighter were filed, given the codename checkmate the design work has taken 3 years and test aircraft are under construction.[19]
On 23 February 2024, smoke was seen emerging from a building located on the site of Sukhoi Design Bureau's headquarters in Moscow.[20]
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