Virgin Galactic Holdings Inc (NYSE:SPCE) said it is "on track" to begin space tourism flights from the second quarter of 2023, with fixes to its mothership complete and a change to its management team.
The VMS Eve mothership is expected to enter ground tests next week and then begin flight tests to check the "enhancements" made after the New Mexico-based company was forced to delay its first commercial flights in September 2021 because of a possible malfunctioning component in its VSS Unity rocket.
The company was forced to abort several missions in recent years due to technical issues and the flight that took founder Sir Richard Branson up to the boundaries of space in the summer of 2021 was later revealed to have seen a few wobbles that had to be investigated by the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).
Aerospace boss Swami Iyer, a former US Air Force test pilot, will be stepping down with immediate effect, while providing ongoing advisory services to chief executive Michael Colglazier until 3 March.
Colglazier commented: "With the completion of the enhancement program for our mothership at hand, our streamlined leadership structure will help propel the business forward as we prepare for commercial spaceline operations."
He said Iyer had been "instrumental" in establishing the company's future production strategy and preparing initial ships for commercial flight.
Last summer, Virgin Galactic agreed that Boeing's Aurora Flight Sciences will design and make its next generation of motherships, while November there were agreements for a new class of space ship, named Delta.
With Iyer departing, the new leadership structure will see former NASA space shuttle launch specialist Mike Moses take the role of president of spaceline missions and safety, having been at the company since 2011.
Mike Moore, a former Delta Airlines technical chief who joined last year, will be executive vice president for spaceline technical operations, while Lockheed Martin (NYSE:LMT) veteran Steve Justice is now in charge of spaceline programs and engineering.
In February last year, Virgin Galactic said tickets for its first public spaceflights were going on sale to the public, at a cost of US$450,000 apiece, with a US$100,000 initial deposit.
In its latest results in November, it reported an increased US$146mln net quarterly loss, with reservations paused at 800 and US$104.8mln held in deposits from 'future astronauts', while US$1.1bn of liquid assets sat on the balance sheet.
The Delta ships will be part-made by Bell Textron, a subsidiary of Textron Inc, Qarbon Aerospace, though Virgin Galactic will continue to be responsible for the overall system architecture, design authority for all components and the final assembly, integration, checkout, and acceptance testing of the vehicles from its new facility in Arizona.
First Delta class spaceships are expected to begin revenue-generating payload flights in late 2025, progressing to private astronaut flights in 2026, flying possibly as much as once a week.
A deal was also signed to fly Axiom Space astronauts to support microgravity research. A spaceflight was "tentatively scheduled" for 2023 to prepare one Axiom Space astronaut for an upcoming trip to orbit, while conducting microgravity research to supplement the work they will do on the International Space Station.