Originally Posted by
tornadoken
DH subsumed Airspeed as a Divn. in 1948 to build Vampire/Venom.
DH actually bought out Airspeed just as WW2 started, in 1940. Airspeed was a bit of a "mom-and-pop" operation on the airfield at Portsmouth, a bit pushed to put out more than one a fortnight. Government eventually had over 8,500 Oxford advanced trainers, plus nearly 4,000 Horsa gliders, they would have been way out of their depth. Airspeed Commercial Director Nevil Shute was more interested in writing his novels.