Energia’s Efforts to Save Sea Launch Could Require Large Bank Loans
Space Company Energia May Finance Satellite Firm Sea Launch
The Moscow Times
Space corporation Energia has received preliminary approval from a U.S. court to pay the operating costs of bankrupt consortium Sea Launch, possibly with the intention of purchasing the company. The specially created Energia subsidiary Energia Overseas Lim ited, or EOL, will help Sea Launch out of bankruptcy. Sea Launch, which launches satellites from an offshore platform, filed for bankruptcy in Delaware on June 22, 2009.
Energia said Wednesday that on April 27 the court gave preliminary approval to an agreement under which EOL would provide $30 million in additional financing for Sea Launch’s operations. Of the sum, $19 million will replace a credit the consortium was expected to get from Space Launch Service and the Heinlein Prize Trust, created after the death of science fiction writer Robert Heinlein.
Sea Launch was created in 1995, with Boeing taking 40 percent, Energia getting 25 percent, Norway’s Aker ASA taking 20 percent and Ukraine’s SDO Yuzhnoye/PO Yuzhmash holding the remaining 15 percent. From a Norwegian-designed platform built in Vyborg, Sea Launch launched satellites on Yuzhnoye-developed, Yuzhmash-built Zenit-3SL rockets, which used a booster from Energia and Russian engines….
It was not by chance that Energia chief Vitaly Lapota said there was a plan to save Sea Launch without specifying how, a second manager in the aerospace industry said. They will have to seek state assistance — a loan for hundreds of millions of dollars from a state bank — to hang on to Sea Launch’s rights to launch Zenit rockets.
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