07/15/2021
Thales Alenia Space and Axiom Space have signed the final contract for the development of two key pressurized elements of Axiom Station. Scheduled for launch in 2024 and 2025 respectively, the two elements will originally be docked to the International Space Station (ISS), marking the birth of the new Axiom Station segment.
Houston-based Axiom Space is going full tilt into scaling production of private space stations, while also flying paying passengers on trips to orbit, with the company announcing Tuesday it received $130 million in a new round of funding.
“This round lets us go make a major payment in the build of our [space station] module and lets us build up the team, which we’ve been expanding at just a crazy pace,” Axiom President and CEO Michael Suffredini told CNBC.
Axiom declined to comment specifically on its valuation, but Suffredini said the company is now “well past the point” of becoming a unicorn, meaning its valuation has surpassed $1 billion. This puts Axiom among the 10-most valuable private U.S. space companies.
One of the new space startups with the loftiest near-term goals has raised $130 million in a Series B round that demonstrates investor confidence in the scope of its ambitions: Axiom Space, which has been tapped by NASA to add privately developed space station modules to the ISS, announced the new funding led by C5 Capital.
This is the latest in a string of high-profile announcements for Axiom, which was founded in 2016 by a team including space professionals with a history of demonstrated expertise working on the International Space Station. Eventually, Axiom hopes to go from adding the first private commercial modules to the existing station, to creating their own, wholly private on-orbital platforms — for research, space tourism and more.
https://techcrunch.com/2021/02/16/axiom-space-raises-130-million-for-its-commercial-space-station-ambitions/