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Boeing throws in the towel on secret spaceplane project for military
The Phantom Express is no more.
Boeing decided to halt the development of the experimental spaceplane it was building as part of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) XS-1 program.
It’s unclear exactly why Boeing is dropping out of the program. However, the company issued a statement saying it would be redirecting its investment from the program to other areas.
“We will now redirect our investment from XSP to other Boeing programs that span the sea, air and space domains,” Boeing said. “We’re proud to have been part of a DARPA-led industry team that collaborated to advance launch-on-demand technology. We will make it a priority to harvest the significant learnings from this effort and apply them as Boeing continues to seek ways to provide future responsive, reusable access to space.”
The company was selected in May 2017 by DARPA, beating out Masten Space Systems and Northrop Grumman for an award totaling $146 million award to design and build an aircraft-like launch system, to launch both military and commercial payloads.
All three companies received phase 1 funding, but only Boeing was selected for phase 2 and 3 of the program. (Phase 2 would have covered the development of the vehicle and the phase 3 contract would have called for up to 15 flights of the vehicle.)
The program was designed to increase the nation’s access to space. DARPA envisioned a reusable spaceplane that would loft hefty payloads rapidly, and at a lower cost — less than $5 million a flight.
“In its pursuit of aircraft-like operability, reliability, and cost-efficiency, DARPA and Boeing are planning to conduct a flight test demonstration of Experimental Spaceplane technology, flying 10 times in 10 days, with an additional final flight carrying the upper-stage payload delivery system,” DARPA said in the program’s mission description.
The major goal of the project is to reuse the spacecraft frequently, with a proposed launch rate of 10 one-day missions in just 10 days. Test flights were scheduled to begin in 2020; however, with Boeing dropping out, the program is now defunct.
The XS-1 would measure 98 feet (30 meters) in length, with a 62-foot-long (19-meter) wingspan. It would fly suborbital trajectories at speeds faster than Mach 10 (10 times the speed of sound), and be capable of depositing small satellites — weighing between 3,000 and 5,000 lbs. (1,360 to 2,267 kilograms) — into orbit.
“The XS-1 would be neither a traditional airplane nor a conventional launch vehicle but rather a combination of the two, with the goal of lowering launch costs by a factor of ten and replacing today’s frustratingly long wait time with launch on demand,” Jess Sponable, DARPA program manager said in a news statement.
Boeing’s Phantom Works division — which built the U.S. Air Force’s two robotic X-37B space planes — was to design, build and test the vehicle.
Dubbed the Phantom Express by Boeing, the suborbital launcher would takeoff vertically, propelled by one Aerojet Rocketdyne AR-22 engine, which was a variant of the space shuttle’s main engine. It would have an expendable upper stage that would separate from the plane before ultimately depositing the payload into orbit.
After upper stage separation, the Phantom Express would glide back to Earth, landing on a runway just like the shuttle did and like the X-37B does now.
“Demonstration of aircraft-like, on-demand, and routine access to space is important for meeting critical Defense Department needs and could help open the door to a range of next-generation commercial opportunities,” Brad Tousley, director of DARPA’s Tactical Technology Office (TTO), which oversees XS-1, said in a news release shortly after Boeing’s selection.
With a burgeoning commercial market opening up in low-Earth orbit, it’s entirely possible that the military’s high-tech agency may still pursue the program in some other fashion, but for now, we bid adieu to the XS-1.
Tesla revealed a major new Cybercab detail in a guide it released for First Responders, showing new territory in its beliefs and intentions for the ride-hailing-focused vehicle that entered production in April.
The First Responders Guide is released to give fire departments, paramedics, and other emergency personnel the proper guidance on what to do in the event of an accident, entrapment, or other situation that would require immediate attention.
On one of the pages of the First Responders Guide, Tesla revealed a stark detail about the Cybercab, which could help personnel enter the vehicle more easily in case of an emergency.
Tesla Cybercab has one important piece that AI4 cars might need for FSD
It shows Tesla has no intention of releasing any Cybercab units that were initially proposed for ride-hailing services for the general public with any manual controls, meaning a steering wheel or pedals:
“A Cybercab equipped with steering wheel, brake pedal, and an acceleration pedal is typically an engineering or test vehicle, and operates at SAE Level 2 autonomy. Cybercab is not typically equipped with a steering wheel or acceleration and brake pedals.”
New official Cybercab documentation from Tesla:
“A Cybercab equipped with steering wheel, brake pedal, and an acceleration pedal is typically an engineering or test vehicle, and operates at SAE Level 2 autonomy. Cybercab is not typically equipped with a steering wheel or… https://t.co/P6ut1mZyzr pic.twitter.com/yq6skl9s2J
— Sawyer Merritt (@SawyerMerritt) June 27, 2026
This is a major development for those who continue to believe Tesla planned to release the Cybercab with any sort of manual controls so that passengers could take over if needed. However, when Tesla started manufacturing production versions of the Cybercab in Giga Texas earlier this year, they were spotted without a steering wheel or pedals.
It essentially confirms the company has no intentions of bringing manual controls to the car’s production versions. Some have argued that the likelihood of Tesla having something
There still are some Cybercab units out there with a steering wheel and pedals, and as Tesla said, these cars are engineering or test vehicles, which have Safety Monitors on board to help the car out of a precarious situation or emergency.
Tesla released the Full Self-Driving v14 ‘Lite’ suite to owners of Hardware 3 or AI3 vehicles today, adding several new features to the vehicles that were once believed to be capable of unsupervised self-driving.
Now, Tesla has released this modified suite to older Tesla vehicles, adding plenty of new features and capabilities.
Here are the full release notes for the suite:
- Distilled the intelligence from HW4 V14 into HW3. This allows HW3 to directly learn how to handle scenarios using HW4 V14 as a guide. This process unlocks the improvements that have been made to HW4 including Reinforcement Learning (RL) and offline models for HW3.
- Improved both proactive and reactive responsiveness across a wide variety of categories including navigation handling, merges and forks, pedestrian interactions, traffic lights, and vehicle cut-in scenarios.
- Improved general comfort in nominal scenarios through fewer false slowdowns, smoother steering and more consistent lane centering.
- Introduced parking, unparking, and reversing capabilities.
- Added Arrival Options for you to select where FSD should park: in a Parking Lot, on the Street, in a Driveway, or at the Curbside.
- Speed Profiles are now available at all times, to further customize driving style preference.
These improvements, according to Tesla’s Head of AI, Ashok Elluswamy, help distill the driving behavior from AI4’s v14 series into both the camera and compute configurations of AI3.
Tesla Full Self-Driving v14 ‘Lite’ for older cars finally gets released
He added:
“It includes destination options and speed profiles on city roads, but more importantly significantly improved safety. We hope you’ll enjoy it, once the build ships wide.”
FSD v14 Lite is now rolling out to AI3 early-access customers. Based on the feedback, will rollout to more customers over the next few weeks.
This build distills the driving behavior from AI4’s v14 series into both the camera and compute config of AI3. It includes destination…
— Ashok Elluswamy (@aelluswamy) June 29, 2026
Tesla will continue to roll out the v14 Lite suite more widely in the coming weeks, the company said.
Tesla has finally released its Full Self-Driving v14 ‘Lite’ suite for older cars that equip the Hardware 3 or AI 3 chip, which have not been able to handle the newest versions of the company’s driver assistance software.
Tesla officially started releasing the v14 Lite suite to owners in the Early Access Program last night. The company’s Head of AI, Ashok Elluswamy, said that the rollout will continue over the next few weeks. The build distills the driving behavior from AI4’s v14 series into both the camera and compute configurations of an AI3 car.
🚨 Tesla is releasing v14 Lite for AI3 owners who are in early-access
This will give AI3 cars the ability to experience new FSD features like parking preferences. https://t.co/pp6Q5FOKoz pic.twitter.com/tqexMB8SVy
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) June 29, 2026
It also includes a variety of new features that were available to AI4 cars running v14, including:
- Start Self-Driving from Park
- Arrival and Parking Options
- Speed Profiles
The release is highly anticipated because those owners with AI3 vehicles were early adopters into the FSD platform and were promised that their cars would be capable of achieving Full Self-Driving.
However, Tesla CEO Elon Musk admitted during the company’s recent Q1 Earnings Call that these vehicles would not be capable of achieving unsupervised Full Self-Driving, which is what Tesla had originally said.
Owners were not pleased with this answer, or the idea that their commitment to buying the suite outright for thousands of dollars would not yield the ability to drive without operating the car. Tesla gave some solutions for this, including a discount on a new car, or an upgrade to an AI4 or AI5 self-driving computer and new, upgraded cameras.
Tesla owners do not seem pleased with these options, as they require giving the company more money.
Nevertheless, it is important to note that Tesla came through for owners here by releasing v14 Lite before the end of Q2, something it had promised owners during the previous Earnings Call. Tesla has had trouble keeping up with timelines, but this is a big achievement for the team.
Tesla reveals huge Cybercab detail in new guide for First Responders
Tesla Full Self-Driving v14 ‘Lite’ Release Notes: new capabilities and features
