Virgin Orbit’s bankruptcy may offer lessons for other launch companies

Like rockets, not every aerospace company reaches the stars.

Virgin Orbit, founded by billionaire Richard Branson, has been struggling to take off in recent months. Its SPAC deal in 2021 raised far less than it expected, and its LauncherOne rocket failed to reach orbit in its first UK-based flight in January of this year.

• Those less-than-stellar results were followed by a mass furlough, then extensive layoffs, with Virgin Orbit announcing it would let go of about 85% of its workforce in an effort to cut costs.
• This week, it announced that it had filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, sending its share price down to $0.15.

Sky is the limit: Claude Rousseau, research director at Northern Sky Research, told Tech Brew that Virgin Orbit’s failure “leaves room for other well-funded launchers to pick up the pieces, because there’s one less competitor out there, or at least a competitor that’s not as active as the others.”

Rousseau emphasized that making a splash in the rocket launch industry is difficult, and it could be a while before small rocket launches reach a cadence similar to larger companies like SpaceX.

“There are things that will be less tangible to evaluate because this is a new and emerging market. Hopefully, we’ll take stock of this to start thinking more iterms of ‘Where’s the business case here? How do we close that business case?” Rousseau said. “How do we ensure that the investment we make becomes, at one point, a revenue generator?’”—JM