Quantum Space announced its intention to go public via SPAC on Monday.
The move to take the in-space mobility company public—and to do so via SPAC instead of IPO—is driven by the company’s desire to move quickly to meet the military’s needs in orbit, Quantum Space CEO Jim Bridenstine said in a press conference. The news comes just one month after Bridenstine was named CEO.
“We need to go as fast as possible to get these capabilities on-orbit as soon as possible,” said Bridenstine, who previously served as a member of Congress as well as NASA administrator. “We need to scale, and to do that we need capital, but it’s also important to have access to public markets for other things we want to do. But the key right now is speed.”
The basics: Quantum Space, which was cofounded by Executive Chair Kam Ghaffarian, will go public via a merger with Inflection Point Acquisition Corp. VI ($IPFX). Inflection Point previously took Intuitive Machines ($LUNR)—the lunar company also founded by Ghaffarian—public via SPAC in 2023.
- The pre-money equity value of Quantum Space is $600M. The company is expected to have an equity value of $1.2B after the merger.
- Quantum is expected to receive ~$253M from Inflection Point’s trust account, plus ~$300M in Private Investment in Public Equity funds.
- Quantum is expecting $24M in revenue this year, and $61M in revenue next year, largely driven by milestone payments on contracts that the company has already won, Bridenstine said.
- Quantum has six contracts and pending proposals with national-security customers, including the Space Force, DARPA, and AFRL.
- After the transaction closes—expected in Q4—Quantum will trade on the Nasdaq under the ticker $QSPC.
What’s next: Bridenstine predicted that the company’s scaling will likely happen through a mix of organic growth and M&A.
“Doing it internally isn’t always the right approach. We might need to work with some of our suppliers, and maybe bring them in-house,” he said.
Amid all of these changes in the business, the technical team is also preparing to launch the first mission for its Ranger space tug next year.
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