Richard Branson’s Space Tourism Company Virgin Galactic Launches On The Stock Exchange, Gains A $2.3bn Valuation

Richard Branson founded Virgin Galactic became the first space tourism company to launch on to public markets as it made its market debut on Monday (28 October).

The company listed directly on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), following the closing of a merger last week with former Facebook executive Chamath Palihapitiya’s venture Social Capital Hedosophia.

In July, Virgin Galactic had announced that it would merge with the cash shell led by Palihapitiya, which was launched in 2017 and is publicly traded in New York.

The shares of Virgin Galactic, traded under the ticker SPCE, rose as high as $12.93 but closed the day down just 0.3 per cent at $11.75. The share price at the close of trading on Monday gives the company a $2.3 billion valuation

“ Virgin Galactic is making history again today as it becomes the world's first and only publicly traded commercial human spaceflight company." George Whitesides, CEO of Virgin Galactic Holdings, said in a statement today. "For the first time, anyone will have the opportunity to invest in a human spaceflight company that is transforming the market. Virgin Galactic has been working tirelessly to turn the concept of human spaceflight into reality, and our IP and engineering skills alongside the talent we have in our business makes us confident and excited about our future."

With a hefty price tag of $250,000 per person, Virgin Galactic soon plans to launch spaceflights that carry many as six passengers at a time. The company plans to begin flying commercial flights in 2020.

Flown by two pilots, spaceship is dropped from a jet-powered aircraft and fires a rocket motor, reaching over three times the speed of sound as it climbs though the Earth’s atmosphere. Then the spacecraft and its passengers float weightless for a few minutes, before gliding back down to land on Earth much like a traditional aircraft.

Virgin Galactic has already signed up 600 people for its proposed space flights. This represents about $80m in sales. The early customers include celebrities like singer Justin Bieber and Hollywood star Leonardo DiCaprio. Virgin Galactic aims to achieve profitability by 2021 with an estimated 115 flights generating $210m in revenue.

Virgin Galactic faces competition from Blue Origin, founded by Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, and Elon Musk’s SpaceX. But Virgin Galactic gained an early lead in the race to create a a new space tourism industry as one of its test flights reached the edge of space in Dec 2018. The company’s space plane reached a height of more than 80km — the altitude at which space is defined to begin.

Much like how Elon Musk ‘s SpaceX has dramatically lowered the costs and ushered in a new era of private space exploration, Virgin Galactic hopes to disrupt the space tourism space.

The compay has already signed up with over 600 astronauts.