Boeing Facing Lawsuit Against McDonnell Family Member

A member of the St. Louis family that ran McDonnell Douglas is suing , alleging Boeing infringed on his patents for an unmanned drone landing system.

Boeing bought the aerospace company in 1997 and William "Randy" McDonnell is seeking $160 million in damages from Boeing and Insitu, Boeing's Washington state subsidiary, over patents related to an unmanned aerial vehicle landing system.

The lawsuit lists six types of Insitu’s unmanned aircraft systems that infringe on Advanced Aerospace’s patents: ScanEagle, NightEagle, Insight, GeoRanger, ScanEagle Compressed Carriage and Integrator. They are small aircraft launched from land or sea primarily for intelligence gathering, surveillance and reconnaissance.

McDonnell filed the suit under his company: Advanced Aerospace Technologies Inc.

Boeing has denied the allegations and said it will fight the lawsuit.

Randy McDonnell is an aeronautical engineer and son of Sanford McDonnell, who was chairman and chief executive of McDonnell Douglas from 1972 to 1988. He is also the cousin of John McDonnell, who was the McDonnell Douglas chairman and CEO in charge when the corporation went through its merger with Boeing.

Boeing's Defense, Space and Security division is headquartered in the . Boeing’s defense unit is a $32 billion business with 63,000 employees worldwide.