Astra has announced a move that, with the exception of a few slide-deck dazzled VCs and investors maybe, surprises no one:

Astra has laid off 25% of its workforce since the beginning of the quarter and is reallocating at least 50 engineers and manufacturing staff away from its launch business to focus on spacecraft production, the company said Friday.

It’s difficult to imagine the company being a player in the launch business anytime soon - if ever.

the only business unit that currently has a near-term chance of generating revenue. The spacecraft engine technology is sourced from Astra’s acquisition of propulsion developer Apollo Fusion, which closed the day Astra went public in July 2021.

Even that looks pretty dicey given the expected Q2 numbers:

• Revenues to be between $0.5 million to $1.0 million,
• GAAP net loss to be between $13.0 million and $15.0 million,
• adjusted EBITDA loss* to be between $32.1 million and $34.1 million,
• basic shares outstanding to be between 271 million and 273 million shares,
• capital expenditures to be between $2.9 million and $3.9 million, and
• cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities to be between $26.0 million and $26.5 million.