We first reported the development of Skylon hypersonic aircraft in 2015. At that time, Skylon was developed by the company Reaction Engine who wanted to produce a space cargo plane for use by the United Kingdom. This was done by developing the SABER engine (Synergetic Air-Breathing Rocket Engine) which can function as a jet and rocket engine simultaneously.
The development of Skylon and the SABER engine is now buried after Reaction Engine filed for bankruptcy on October 31. The company's operations could not continue after it failed to raise the necessary funds. The SABER engine has been developed for the past 35 years but has not yet become a reality and has only managed to do a few tests.
The original target was SABER to be used on Skylon which can fly at speeds of up to 5000 km/h. It will fly like a normal plane on earth using a jet engine before SABER changes to rocket mode to fly into space.
As well as causing the Skylon project to stall, the development of the UK's home-grown hypersonic weapon is also now affected as SABER engine technology is also supposed to be used.