Textron Inc.

What does Textron own?
Textron owns Textron Aviation (Cessna, Beechcraft, Hawker), Bell, Textron Systems, and industrial brands including EZGO, Jacobsen, and Kautex. It sold its Arctic Cat powersports business in 2025.

Is Textron publicly traded?
Yes. It trades on the New York Stock Exchange under ticker TXT and is an S&P 500 component.

What is the MV-75?
The MV-75 is the US Army's designation for the Bell V-280 Valor tiltrotor selected for the Future Long-Range Assault Aircraft program in December 2022, intended to replace Black Hawk helicopters.

Who founded Textron?
Royal Little founded the company as Special Yarns Corporation in 1923 in Providence, Rhode Island, building it into the model of the modern conglomerate.

Did Textron sell Arctic Cat?
Yes. Textron divested its powersports business including Arctic Cat in 2025 as part of an Industrial segment restructuring.

How much revenue does Textron generate?
$14.8 billion in FY2025, up 8 percent, with segment profit of $1.4 billion.

Where is Textron headquartered?
Providence, Rhode Island, USA.

Royal Little founded Special Yarns Corporation in 1923 in Providence, producing rayon yarn. The company renamed itself Textron in the 1950s and became the archetype of the postwar conglomerate, acquiring businesses with no relationship to each other, from helicopters to chain saws to watch companies, under the theory that professional management could run anything.

The defense core arrived in two strokes. Textron bought Bell Aircraft's helicopter division in 1960, and acquired the aerospace fastener maker Avco in 1985. The 1980s and 1990s saw pruning toward aerospace and industrial products, including the 1992 acquisition of Cessna, the world's largest general aviation company, for approximately $600 million.

The modern portfolio took shape through the 2000s: Textron consolidated its aviation brands under Textron Aviation in 2014, folding Beechcraft, acquired out of bankruptcy in 2013, together with Cessna and Hawker. Bell, rebranded from Bell Helicopter in 2018, developed tiltrotor technology that culminated in the December 2022 award of the US Army's Future Long-Range Assault Aircraft contract to the Bell V-280 Valor, a program worth more than $70 billion in potential lifecycle value and the service's largest rotorcraft procurement in decades. The Army designated it the MV-75, and the program accelerated under the 2025 Army Transformation Initiative.

Scott Donnelly, a former General Electric aviation executive, has led Textron as CEO since 2009 and chairman since 2011, the longest-serving chief executive in the company's modern era.

The company's exposure is operational: aircraft manufacturing, defense production, and a global supply chain. Textron publishes sustainability reporting covering emissions, workforce safety, and ethics programs.

Its products sit on both sides of the emissions question: efficient small aircraft and electric-adjacent utility vehicles on one side, military helicopters on the other. The company reports through standard ESG frameworks; no independent certification applies to the core businesses.

2024 machinists' strike: A multi-week strike at Textron Aviation's Wichita plants depressed 2024 deliveries and profit; the 2025 rebound was partly recovery from that disruption.

Defense program scrutiny: The MV-75, like every major weapons program, faces Government Accountability Office and congressional oversight on cost and schedule, with acceleration under the Army Transformation Initiative drawing both support and skepticism.

Cluster munitions legacy: Textron's earlier production of cluster munition systems drew criticism from human rights groups; the company exited that product line years ago but it remains part of the public record.