AAI Corporation is an aerospace and defense development and manufacturing firm, located in Hunt Valley, Maryland, US. Formerly a wholly owned subsidiary of United Industrial Corporation, AAI was acquired by Textron in 2007. It currently operates as a unit of Textron Systems and employs more than 2,000. AAI's products and services include unmanned aircraft and ground control technologies; training and simulation systems; automated aerospace test and maintenance equipment; armament systems; and logistical, engineering, supply chain and operational support services, multi-turreted tracked ground combat vehicles. The company's customers include the United States Department of Defense (DoD) and its prime contractors, allied foreign government ministries of defense, and other United States federal agencies. History AAI Corporation originated as Aircraft Armaments, Inc. in August 1950, founded by six aviation and defense industry professionals. It was renamed AAI Corporation in the late 1950s. AAI's parent company, United Industrial Corporation (UIC), was founded as Hayes Body Corporation in the early 1900s. Renamed many years later, UIC was admitted into the New York Stock Exchange for trading on December 15, 1964. From 1994 to 2004, AAI partnered with the Czech firm, Škoda, in a joint venture to manufacture trolley buses. The joint venture, named Electric Transit, Inc., supplied 330 trolley buses to San Francisco and Dayton before being dissolved in 2004. On 22 June 2006 Aerosonde Ltd was acquired by AAI. Textron acquired AAI and other subsidiaries of UIC with its purchase of the parent company for approximately $1.1 billion in 2007. AAI became part of Textron's helicopter subsidiary, Bell Textron, in the acquisition. Today, AAI owns or occupies more than of office and manufacturing space across Australia, the United Kingdom and the USA. As of May 2014, AAI had been made into three parts: Unmanned Systems, Support Solutions, and Electronic Systems. The company is still registered as an active corporation in the State of Maryland under the name, AAI Corporation. Products & services Unmanned systems AAI is one of a limited number of companies engaged in the design and full-rate production of a successfully fielded, operational unmanned aircraft system (UAS) for the DoD. AAI first began development work on the unmanned systems product line in 1985, winning a competitive fly-off with its Pioneer Remotely Piloted Vehicle. The company's unmanned aircraft systems include the Shadow 200 Tactical UAS, which is designated RQ-7B by the U.S. Army, as well as the Shadow 400 and 600 systems. As