The company was established in 1946 at the Novosibirsk Aircraft Production Association as the top-secret Soviet Research and Design Bureau No. 153 (OKB-153). It was headed by Oleg Antonov and specialised in turboprop military transport aircraft. The task was to create an agricultural aircraft CX-1 (An-2), the first flight of which occurred on August 31, 1947. The An-2 biplane was a major achievement of this period, with hundreds of these aircraft still operating as of 2013.[6] In addition to this biplane and its modifications, a small series of gliders A-9 and A-10 were created and built in the pilot production in Novosibirsk. In 1952, the Bureau was relocated to Kiev, a city with a rich aviation history and an aircraft-manufacturing infrastructure restored after the destruction caused by World War II.