Seraphim Space Investment Trust plc takes portfolio to 21 companies

Seraphim Space Investment Trust PLC (LSE:SSIT) said it completed the purchase of two holdings from its privately owned sister fund for £28.1mln cash shares, taking its portfolio to 21 space-tech companies.

The London-listed investment company acquired the holdings of ICEYE Oy and D-Orbit SpA from Seraphim Space LP, known as Seraphim Space Fund, whose partners spent the remaining £27.3mln of post-tax cash to subscribe for new ordinary shares in the trust at a price of 100p per share.

These purchases represent the final two of four acquisitions from the Seraphim Space Fund agreed at the time of July’s initial public offer.

Finland-based ICEYE operates a large constellation of mini satellites that use radar to track images of the Earth, night and day and through clouds, with the data used by customers, including governments, to track illegal deforestation in the Amazon and insurance companies to respond quickly to natural disasters such as floods.

The trust made an additional investment in ICEYE earlier this month.

Seraphim said D-Orbit, which is based in Como, Italy, is the market leader in the space logistics and orbital transportation services industry as its ‘ION’ satellite carrier spacecraft is “the only space logistics solution currently available that offers a flexible, cost-effective in-orbit ‘last mile’ delivery solution that guarantees satellite deployment in requested orbits and reduces customers’ time from launch to revenue generation”.

Once its customers’ satellites have been rocketed into space by the likes of Elon Musk’s SpaceX or a Russian Soyuz, D-Orbit’s ION spacecraft delivers them to their destinations, before undertaking, if necessary, a range of additional secondary in-orbit applications such as analytics, data storage and relay communications.

Seraphim said additional applications, including space debris removal and satellite servicing, are anticipated to accelerate the growth and development of what is expected to be trillion-dollar in-orbit space economy.

D-Orbit is also the first space company worldwide to be a certified a B Corporation, reflecting that its purpose-driven mission benefits all stakeholders.

Mark Boggett, chief executive of Seraphim Space (Manager) LLP, the company’s investment manager, said: “We have done everything we had set out to do at the time of the IPO and have also invested in a variety of new portfolio companies that are rapidly transforming the SpaceTech sector to provide solutions to some of the world’s most pressing problems.”