Boeing says it plans to move its corporate headquarters from Chicago to the Washington, D.C., area.

The company made it official on Thursday.

Boeing is a major defense contractor, so the move would put its executives in Arlington, Virginia, close to customers in the Pentagon.

It would also put them near the Federal Aviation Administration, which regulates Boeing's business of building passenger airplanes.

The relocation will also put the company close to its rivals, including Lockheed Martin and General Dynamics, which already in the D.C. area.

Boeing’s roots are in the Seattle area, and it has assembly plants in Washington state and South Carolina.

The company moved its headquarters to Chicago in 2001 after an unusually public search that also considered Dallas and Denver.

Boeing isn’t the only company to recently decide to pack its bags for the D.C. area.

In April, local officials approved Amazon’s plan to build a 350-foot-tall building in Arlington.

The building will serve as Amazon’s second headquarters.