 The Type 138 was born of a period of intense competition between aviation manufacturers in the 1920s and 1930s.There was much prestige, as well as useful technological progress, to be gained from breaking any of the major aviation records; these being airspeed, distance and altitude.By the 1930s, the resources and development work necessary to realistically achieve absolute speed and distance records were becoming beyond the resources of individual companies, and required the involvement of national governments.