The Long Beach Business Journal just published an interesting piece on Rocket Lab’s recent acquisition of Virgin Orbit’s manufacturing facility and equipment that sheds a little more light on how the company plans to put it all to use:
The company’s current headquarters, which includes office space as well as manufacturing operations, is about 60,000 square feet, Spice said. The former Virgin Orbit building—one of the oldest at Douglas Park—is more than twice the size at 140,000 square feet.
The Long Beach expansion will allow the company to further compartmentalize its operations across its various facilities. As it is, the headquarters factory floor is where the company builds out its avionics and propulsion systems—Electron’s Rutherford engines and Neutron’s Archimedes engines.
The Rutherfords are then sent to Rocket Lab’s New Zealand facility, where they are integrated into the Electron rockets. The company has a facility under construction near its Virginia launch complex, where the Archimedes engines will be sent for Neutron construction.
In addition to launch services aboard its Electron rocket (and Neutron in the future), the company has its space systems division, which focuses on the design and construction of spacecraft for other companies and organizations. Space systems also is located within the company’s headquarters.
The bulk of engine manufacturing and assembly will be moved into the new, larger Long Beach facility, which will allow Rocket Lab to expand its space systems division at its headquarters, Spice said.
While unfortunate for Virgin Orbit the positive impact for Rocket Lab is just off the charts
Rocket Lab placed the winning bid of $16.1 million for Virgin Orbit’s Douglas Park headquarters as well as much of the equipment in it, which Spice said would have cost upward $100 million if it were bought new. On top of that, Spice noted that, once ordered, it can take over a year to receive these complex pieces of equipment such as large 3D printers and state-of-the-art milling machines.
“For every one piece of equipment we have here, there might be five over there,” Spice said, comparing his company’s headquarters to the old Virgin Orbit facility. “I think they took a ‘Jurassic Park, spare no expense’ approach.”
And on top of all this:
In addition to space and equipment, the Virgin Orbit breakdown provided Rocket Lab dozens of new employees as well as multiple contracts previously awarded to the failed company, Spice said.
The space business is incredibly challenging on all fronts but Rocket Lab continues to create its own tailwinds as it both executes and continues to aggressively stretch every dollar as it pursues growth.
