Spain’s Zero2infinity is in talks about an investment that would fully fund its balloon-based small satellite and space tourism launch vehicles, SatelliteFinance understands. Sources said the Barcelona-headquartered venture, due to begin orbital trials for its ‘bloostar’ nanosat launcher in 2018, is in a due diligence process and has been looking for around €50m (US$55m) in total.
Spain’s Zero2infinity is in talks about an investment that would fully fund its balloon-based small satellite and space tourism launch vehicles, SatelliteFinance understands.
Sources said the Barcelona-headquartered venture, due to begin orbital trials for its ‘bloostar’ nanosat launcher in 2018, is in a due diligence process and has been looking for around €50m (US$55m) in total.
Zero2infinity declined to comment.
The group has secured at least one investment round of about €2m (US$2.2m) since being founded in 2009, and has previously worked with Deloitte on fundraising initiatives.
Current investors include a mix of private capital from Spain, France, Germany and Hong Kong, as well as the world’s largest manufacturer of human-rated balloons.
In January 2014, Zero2infinity CEO José Urdiales told SatelliteFinance that it planned to begin commercially offering its space tourism initiative that year, with a manned high-altitude balloon-based system called ‘bloon’ designed to bring customers up as high as 44k metres.
However, the fatal test flight crash of Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo space tourism craft in October 2014 has impacted demand, as well as investor appetite, leading Zero2infinity to switch its priority to bloostar. The shift means bloostar, which is set for suborbital trials in 2016, will now likely be offered commercially ahead of bloon.
Recent growth in the small satellite market has spawned a number of alternative launch startups, including those developing air launch systems that will use planes rather than balloons.
But some question whether there is a need for alternative launch systems given the wide availability of rideshare options, where smallsats piggyback on larger payloads.
Helping to differentiate Zero2infinity in the increasingly crowded market is the revenues it is already generating from balloon-based test flights, mostly for undisclosed government and aerospace corporations.
One of these clients is understood to be Spacecialist, a small research outfit from Israel.
World View gets US$15m Arizona base
US-based World View has also been developing a balloon-based flight system, and will primarily target space tourism when it begins commercial flights around the end of 2017.
Arizona state officials voted 4-1 on Tuesday to spend US$15m on building new headquarters, a manufacturing facility and launch site this year for World View outside the Tucson International Airport, near to where it is currently based.
The company had considered rival proposals from Florida and New Mexico as it looks to ramp up work on its Voyager capsule. Designed to fit six passengers and two crewmembers, Voyager will use a high-altitude balloon to reach around 30.5k metres at US$75,000 per customer.
Florida’s proposal included building and equipment financing, attractive lease rates, tax refunds and property tax abatements. New Mexico offered a similar agreement that also included a substantial expenditure from their “deal closing” funds, according to Pima County documents.
With Arizona’s support, state officials expect World View to grow from around 25 employees to more than 400 in the next five years. The company has agreed to lease its new headquarters for US$675k-1.62m annually over a 20-year period.
Sharon Bronson, chair of the Pima County board of supervisors, said World View’s decision to stay and grow their company marked the beginning of “thousands, maybe even hundreds of thousands of new jobs” for the Sonoran Corridor, an economic development initiative for the county and Southern Arizona. The scheme covers a 130 square kilometre area surrounding Tucson International Airport, and includes some of Pima County’s largest employers such as Raytheon Missile Systems.
“This is how public-private partnerships are supposed to work,” Bronson said.
“World View is getting the help it needs to get off the ground, literally, and Pima County is getting the private investment necessary to bring high-wage jobs to our valley.”
Board member Ally Miller reportedly voted against the plan because of a lack of information about World View’s business, finances, and how it would deal with any risk of delays.
New Mexico’s Spaceport America, which has received hundreds of millions of dollars of state and local tax money, is a notable example of such risks. The setback for Virgin Galactic, Spaceport America’s anchor tenant, has added to the pressure on the group to find alternative revenue sources.
World View also needs a licence from the Federal Aviation Administration to use the launchpad, and another to certify its balloon-based system.
In the meantime, like Zero2infinity, it plans to continue flying research payloads. It has a contract with NASA under the US space agency’s Flight Opportunities programme. The group announced in March 2015 that it had completed its first commercial flight carrying research payloads.
