The CEO Who Sold His Drone Company To Google Was Responsible For 'One Of The Largest Financial Disasters In Aviation History'

Earlier this month, Google bought drone company Titan Aerospace for an undisclosed amount of money.

Facebook was reportedly looking at paying $60 million for Titan, and Google beat it out, so that gives you some idea of a likely price.

This outcome is a good result for Titan Aerospace CEO and chairman, Vern Raburn, who just joined the company last October.

According to Brad Stone at Bloomberg Businessweek, this wasn't Raburn's first foray in aviation, or with a technology company.

He was the 18th Microsoft employee.

After Microsoft, he launched his own company called Eclipse Aviation.

Raburn's company attempted to build a lightweight, private airplane. It got funding from Bill Gates and others, but it never worked out.

Eclipse burned through $1 billion in funding before going bankrupt. Stone says, "It's now considered one of the largest financial disasters in aviation history."

Eclipse was acquired and is now in the midst of a turnaround.

Titan was only around for two years before Google bought it.

It shows how much the world has changed. With new technology, new forms of aviation are possible. And with Google looking to change the world, Raburn tells Stone there is a whole new class of companies will to buy something like Titan.

Read more at Bloomberg Businesweek >