Crazy. I didn't know you could acquire things worth 20x more than you.
Dell bought EMC for 67b when they were worth 24b
Rocketlab acquires Iridium
11–20 of 318 posts
Re: Rocketlab acquires Iridium
#12Rocket lab used to be a New Zealand source of pride, having started there. From the press release, now it’s American. What happened?
Needs access to American capital markets, contracts, governance structures, and jurisdiction (applicable law).
Re: Rocketlab acquires Iridium
#13Re: Rocketlab acquires Iridium
#14Rocket lab used to be a New Zealand source of pride, having started there. From the press release, now it’s American. What happened?
Re: Rocketlab acquires Iridium
#15Rocket lab used to be a New Zealand source of pride, having started there. From the press release, now it’s American. What happened?
It was always an American company. In order to launch rockets from countries in the US sphere of influence (even from NZ), companies must obtain an FAA license.
Rocket technology itself is so intensely regulated by US export control laws that it’s practically impossible to develop an orbital launch vehicle without being a US- or Europe-registered company.
It is a real shame. It also looks like a lot of engineering work is shifting away from NZ — Auckland seems to be focusing more on operations and space systems, and the launch stuff is moving to the US with Neutron.
Re: Rocketlab acquires Iridium
#16Re: Rocketlab acquires Iridium
#17Rocket lab used to be a New Zealand source of pride, having started there. From the press release, now it’s American. What happened?
Capital probably, market access. It is pretty hard to raise capital for high risk ventures like that everywhere in the world other than the US.
Re: Rocketlab acquires Iridium
#18Crazy. I didn't know you could acquire things worth 20x more than you.
RocketLab market cap is 57b. Iridium market cap was 5.5b and this transaction values it at 8b.
I'm guessing they acquired it mostly exchanging stocks. Which I guess is an indication that their stock is overvalued right now if they're willing to overpay by that much.
Re: Rocketlab acquires Iridium
#19RocketLab gains spectrum + profitable satellite company
Iridum gains 23 launches per year with 100% success rate in the past 12 months, a satellite manufacturing pipeline with 6 satellites produced and launched, and a cost-to-orbit of $25K/kg operational (with an in-development design targetting $4K/kg).
They are late compared to SpaceX, to be sure: 150 launches per year, 2400 satellites manufactured per year, $3K/kg operational with F9, target $200/kg in development with Starship.
Re: Rocketlab acquires Iridium
#20I think they saw how SpaceX was using Starlink as launch lever to provide SpaceX a baseline of regular launches at bare-minimum cost. As RocketLab starts to scale up, being able guarantee a minimum number of launches is a significant hedge against the dips in the global satellite market.
Also, RocketLab builds their own sats and can add the Iridium constellation replacements to their order book. It's a win-win. A smart move by Peter Beck and his team.