Business Notes AEROSPACE

The partnership would have been unthinkable a few years ago. Sukhoi, the Soviet maker of military planes, and Gulfstream, the most prestigious name in U.S. corporate jets, are making tentative plans to build a supersonic business aircraft. In a $1 billion project, the two manufacturers hope to produce a jet that will fly at 1,500 m.p.h., twice the speed of sound, and carry as many as 20 passengers over a range of more than 5,600 miles. The plane would sell for about $50 million.

The project is still in the design stage and faces abundant obstacles, including concerns about the effect of sonic booms on the environment and the licensing of advanced U.S. technology to the Soviets. But the partners plan to have detailed designs ready within a few weeks and hope to fly the plane by 1995. Sukhoi will have prime responsibility for the airframe; Gulfstream will concentrate on electronics and cockpit design; and Rolls-Royce has been enlisted to help design the plane's engines.