Virgin Galactic

Virgin Galactic is a British-American spaceflight company founded in 2004 by Sir Richard Branson and the Virgin Group to offer commercial suborbital human spaceflight. Its corporate headquarters are in Tustin, California, while flight operations are based at Spaceport America in New Mexico.

The company builds an air-launched spaceflight system: the SpaceShipTwo rocket-powered spaceplane (VSS Unity) is carried aloft by the WhiteKnightTwo mothership (VMS Eve) and released at altitude to rocket above 50 miles, the U.S. boundary of space. It flies private astronauts (space tourists) as well as researchers carrying microgravity experiments.

VSS Unity flew the company's commercial service from 2023 before being retired after its final flight, Galactic 07, in June 2024. Virgin Galactic has since concentrated its resources on its next-generation Delta-class spaceships, which are designed to carry six passengers at a much higher flight cadence, with test flights targeted for 2025-2026 and commercial service planned for late 2026 onward.