Rocket pioneer raises

Private capital moves into commercial laun

The first commercial space launch rocket company in China has secured financing of 1.2 billion yuan ($181.36 million), which will be used for the development and launch of its Kuaizhou series carrier rockets, the company said on Tuesday.

The Kuaizhou rockets were developed by Expace, the commercial space launch rocket arm jointly established in February 2016 by State-owned China Aerospace Science and Industry Corp (CASIC) and China Sanjiang Space Group.

The company said it signed funding agreements with eight investment institutions at the Shanghai United Assets and Equity Exchange on Monday. The funds will be used for the research and development of its Kuaizhou series carrier rockets, a rocket assembly facility and other upstream and downstream commercial space businesses, according to a document that Expace sent to the Global Times on Tuesday.

Expace Chairman Zhang Di said at the signing ceremony that the Kuaizhou-11, the company’s latest carrier rocket, has entered the testing and debugging phase and is scheduled to embark on its maiden flight carrying six satellites in the first half of 2018.

Among the eight investors, Zhejiang United Investment Group (ZUIG) provided private-sector funding.

“Our investment in Expace is indeed our first foray into the commercial aerospace sector,” Zhou Guanxin, vice president of ZUIG, told the Global Times on Tuesday. Zhou didn’t specify the scale of investment.

“Such cooperation will not only incorporate more private-sector subcontractors but also draw efficiency and capability from other interested parties. The civil-military integration strategy creates access for private investors such as us, giving us the opportunity to participate in the commercialization of space technology,” Zhou noted.

Lan Tianyi, founder of Beijing-based Ultimate Blue Nebula Co, a space industry consultancy, told the Global Times on Tuesday that “the door has been opened wider for private funds in recent years

“The ci integra creates investo giving u to parti comme space t