Commercial aerospace company Maritime Launch Services has begun trading on the NEO Exchange.
NEO’s president and CEO, Jos Schmitt, said Maritime is the first space-related corporate listing on the exchange.
“There is a global space race well underway and now is the time for Canadian investors to participate in this innovative sector and own a piece of this unique Canadian asset.”
– Stephen Matier
Maritime announced last year that it planned to go public through a reverse takeover of Jaguar Financial Corporation, a Canadian merchant bank.
As of October, the previously TSX Venture Exchange-listed Jaguar had been shut down and delisted from the TSXV’s NEX board, which is for companies that have fallen below listing standards. In November, Maritime said that it intended to trade in the Canadian Securities Exchange (CSE).
Maritime declined to disclose why it switched from the CSE to the NEO Exchange.
A spokesperson for the company also told BetaKit that Maritime has raised $17 million in funding to date.
Based in Halifax and founded in 2016, Maritime is developing a launch site that will provide satellite delivery services to clients. Named “Spaceport Nova Scotia,” the development of this facility will allow the Cyclone-4M and other prospective launch vehicles to place their satellites into low-earth orbit. The company claims Spaceport Nova Scotia will be the first commercial orbital launch complex in Canada.
Maritime said that its satellites that will be launched from Canso, Nova Scotia will bring 60 years of Canadian pioneering to bear on some global issues. The company claimed this includes climate change, illegal deforestation, as well as uses for agriculture and urbanization. The startup plans to serve companies that collect data on space exploration, invent groundbreaking technologies, or bring communications to remote markets and communities.
Maritime is led by president and CEO Stephen Matier, a mechanical engineer and former NASA contractor engineering manager. He called the space firm’s NEO listing a “key building block” toward Maritime’s plans to acquire a share of the commercial space industry market, which is expected to reach $56.32 billion by 2031.
Matier added that Maritime’s NEO listing will also provide the company with greater access to a diverse mix of equity investors and financing partners to develop Spaceport Nova Scotia and attract talent.
“There is a global space race well underway and now is the time for Canadian investors to participate in this innovative sector and own a piece of this unique Canadian asset,” he said.
Maritime said that it expects to launch approximately eight missions per year by its fifth year of operations. The company said the spaceport will be fully operational by 2023. It also plans to place satellites into polar and sun-synchronous orbits, using the Ukrainian Cyclone-4M rockets, as early as next year.
Photo courtesy of Unsplash.