Virgin Orbit’s launch business sold for parts to Vast, Stratolaunch, and Rocket Lab

Virgin Orbit, once valued at $3.7B, has been chopped up for parts.

The company has concluded the auction for its assets, which were put up for sale as part of its Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings. Altogether, the three winning bids come to around $36 million dollars.

The winning bids were submitted by Rocket Lab, Launcher (and its parent company, Vast), and Stratolaunch. According to court filings, Rocket Lab will get Virgin’s Long Beach, California-based manufacuturing facility for $16.1 million; Launcher successfully bid for the Mojave-based facilities for $2.7 million; and Virgin’s “Cosmic Girl” aircraft and related assets will go to Stratolaunch for $17 million.

Stratolaunch had submitted a “stalking horse” bid for the modified Boeing 747 aircraft earlier this month. A stalking horse bid sets the minimum floor price for the assets, so it appears that Virgin did not receive any competing bids for that property.

TechCrunch has reached out to Rocket Lab, Stratolaunch and Vast and will update the story if they respond.

Virgin Orbit filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on April 4 months of bad news: in January, a failed rocket launch from Cornwall, U.K., followed by an announcement that it was furloughing most of its staff due to insufficient capital. The company entered bankruptcy after it failed to secure additional funding to continue operations.

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Virgin Orbit’s launch business sold for parts to Vast, Stratolaunch, and Rocket Lab by Aria Alamalhodaei originally published on TechCrunch