Virgin Galactic Delays the Launch of Its Delta Spaceplane
The new age of space tourism hasn’t arrived quite yet.
Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic is delaying the launch of its much-anticipated Delta spacecraft, a vessel for both tourists and research opportunities to reach suborbital flight. The craft was set to debut in summer 2026 but is now slated for the fall of that year, Bloomberg reported.
The British American company has paused all commercial operations since June 2024 in anticipation of the Delta commercial flight’s launch next year, after which tourism trips will resume. The updated timeline follows quarterly financial results that fell short of analysts’ expectations.
Virgin Galactic reported about $410,000 in revenue for the second quarter, slightly below the $420,000 forecasted by analysts polled by Bloomberg. The company also reduced the size of its in-house engineering team and overall workforce by 7 percent as it fights to bring to market the upgraded Delta spaceplane.
While Virgin Galactic stock has been down roughly 35 percent for the year, shares rose 2.1 percent in US postmarket trading this week—a relief for investors who expected a greater loss per share of $2.34 compared to the actual $1.47 dip.
Prior to the halt in operations, Virgin Galactic had been selling seats on the Delta spacecraft for around $600,000, and said it plans to raise prices when ticket sales resume at the start of 2026, according to Bloomberg.
The company’s current focus is on developing the upgraded spaceplane, which is being optimized for reusability and faster turnaround time between flights—perhaps an effort to compete with rival commercial space tech companies like Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin LLC or Elon Musk’s SpaceX. In all cases, flights are sold as short trips to space for sightseeing or research.
Virgin Galactic told Bloomberg that it burned through roughly $55 million in cash during the second quarter, down from around $79 million during the same period last year. It had cash, cash equivalents, and marketable securities of $508 million as of the end of June.
Hopefully, Virgin Galactic can unveil a groundbreaking Delta spaceplane next fall in the wake of ongoing delays. While it’s unclear what the availability and pricing of the commercial flights will be, one thing is certain: We can’t hop on just yet.
