Virgin Orbit shows interest in Polish startup

Wroclaw based startup SatRevolution plans to launch over 1,000 Earth observation nanosatellites. The project has drawn the interest of British billionaire and owner of the Virgin empire Richard Branson, the Rzeczpospolita daily reported on Friday.

"We are building a space industry which is rapidly gathering speed." the newspaper emphasised.

Rzeczpospolita also reported that the Wroclaw startup SatRevolution received a letter of intention regarding a collaboration with Virgin Orbit, a space company set up by Branson. Virgin Orbit has shown great interest in the REC (Real-time Earth-observation Constellation) project, which plans to launch the nanosatellites into orbit.

Constellations of small satellites can be used by telecommunications systems in order to predict natural disasters or the creation of extremely accurate maps. Stephen Eisele, the vice president of business development at Virgin Orbit, does not hide the fact that the SatRevolution project may have a major influence on the Earth observation market.

"The proposed REC constellations will be an exceptional proposal in this area and will create a great deal of interest among clients." said Eisele. He stressed that Virgin Orbit is interested in developing a cooperation through the use of the company's LauncherOne rocket system for the launch of the satellite constellations. However, details of the potential collaboration are currently unknown.