The Pivdenne Design Bureau (Yuzhnoye, Dnipro) is optimistic about a potential of mutually beneficial Ukrainian-U.S. cooperation in the rocket engines and working out plans to create a rocket engine production facility in the United States, Pivdenne Design Bureau Director General Oleksandr Degtyarev has said.

During a press conference on Tuesday in Dnipro, assessing, at the request of journalists, the current state of the dialogue with the United States initiated by Ukraine in the new geopolitical situation to review the content of the bilateral partnership in the space sphere, Degtyarev said: "America will live in space without Ukraine, but it does not mean that we have no prospects."

According to him, the exacerbation of relations between the United States and the Russian Federation caused the political "unacceptability of the Russian presence in U.S. space." First of all, these are Russian RD-180 engines, he said, noting that this situation opens up additional opportunities for the development of cooperation between Ukraine and the United States in the field of rocket engine building. "We have ambitions and experience to replace the RD-180 with the RD-815 [a new Ukrainian cruise engine with a load of 250 tonnes]," he said.

"I do not rule out that the RD-815 engines will be in demand," Degtyarev said, adding: "When it is profitable, no one refuses... We have additional opportunities, and they should be used."

According to the director general of the bureau, in addition to the RD-815 mid-flight engines, the new Ukrainian RD-870 mid-flight engine with the load of up to 100 tonnes is also of great interest to potential customers.

"Our plans are to create a production facility for Ukrainian-made engines in the United States," Degtyarev said, adding: "We see prospects in this, because it provides many political privileges and many opportunities."

He said that today, the United States is the world's leading space state with its market, actively promoting, including many space "startups."