Boeing replaces chief of its Starliner spacecraft unit

Orlando, Florida: The vice president leading Boeing's Starliner spacecraft unit, Mark Nappi, has left the program and was replaced by the company's International Space Station program manager, John Mulholland, a Boeing spokesperson told Reuters on Thursday.

Nappi, who led Boeing's Starliner program from 2022 through major engineering issues and testing mishaps, is in a new role "focused on identifying opportunities for streamlining improvement across the division's space programs until he retires next month," Boeing said.

Mulholland previously led Boeing's Starliner program since 2011 before switching in 2020 to the company's International Space Station program, which works closely with NASA under a multibillion-dollar station operations contract.

Boeing's Starliner spacecraft, in development under a $4.5 billion NASA contract to ferry astronauts to the ISS, has faced an array of engineering challenges since 2019.

In its first test mission last summer flying astronauts, Starliner was forced by NASA to leave its crew aboard the ISS and return empty in September over risky problems with its propulsion system.