Space Ventures Investors Ltd (UK) and Space Centre Australia Pty Ltd (Australia) have signed a Letter of Intent (LOI) that Space Ventures Investors (SVI) has agreed to in principle to invest in Space Centre Australia (SCA).
Simon Drake, CEO of Space Ventures Investors explains the significance of this LOI: “The strategic importance of an equatorial, southern hemisphere, heavy launch, spaceport has long been overlooked, and Space Centre Australia is actively developing such a spaceport in North Queensland. A thriving space economy requires a variety of large launch facilities that have a geographical and geopolitical fit. The goal is that Europe, East Asia and even North America, can safely launch from North Australia. I distinctly remember growing up in Queensland in the 1990s, there were ambitious plans to make a spaceport in the north, however national and state-level political distractions have left this task up to us, in the 2020s, to make it a reality.”
Space Ventures Investors Limited is an early-stage investor in international space startups including earth observation, launch, and space resources and Lunar landers. It is scaling up to support the next wave of space innovation, such as infrastructure-level operations like launch solutions that are cheaper and more environmentally friendly, new spaceports, space based solar power, and the extraction of resources from the surface of the moon.
Space Centre Australia has support from the Australian Space Agency, Federal and State Governments and traditional owners. It is building a strategically located launch facility in North Australia. It is also developing a Net Zero Launch Infrastructure, manufacturing technologies for launch vehicles and payloads, a state-of-the-art datacentre infrastructure to manage space mission data efficiently, and initiatives in green energy infrastructure like geothermal and hydrogen production to lessen the dependency on conventional energy sources.
James Palmer, CEO of Space Centre Australia, states: “Investing in space infrastructure and exploration isn’t merely a choice; it’s a paramount necessity. Just as we prioritize investing in a burgeoning Australian company with a global reach, we must grasp that our collaboration with Space Ventures Investors magnifies the significance of ongoing international interest in the development of our launch facility.”