Blackstar Orbital Technologies, a company developing a reusable spacecraft platform, plans to go public through a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) merger. BlackStar announced the deal with SPAC Pono Capital Four on Thursday that values the company at $380 million.
The company is developing the SpaceDrone, which is designed to launch on a traditional rocket like a payload, then perform missions in Low-Earth Orbit and return to Earth to land on a runway to recover payloads and return to flight. BlackStar, which is based in Florida, has received $1.9 million in U.S. government R&D funding and reports $120 million in commercial letters of intent from customers ranging from in orbit servicing to in-space compute.
“Today’s satellites are generally designed without a return path. Blackstar Orbital is developing a spacecraft platform built around recovery, reuse and reflight,” said Christopher Jannette, president and CEO of Blackstar Orbital. “SpaceDrone is designed to launch aboard existing rockets, operate in low Earth orbit, return mission payloads to Earth and land on a runway. We believe this transaction will accelerate our path toward making repeatable access to and return from orbit a practical capability for government and commercial customers.”
Pono Capital Four is led by Dustin Shindo, former CEO of software firm Junify and former founder and CEO of fuel cell startup Hoku. He also founded Pono Corporation, which operated healthcare data, medical devices, and drug development.
The SPAC merger is targeted to be completed in the first quarter of 2027.
