Orbex, the Scottish space launch company that received almost £77 million in public funding, has collapsed into administration. The company employed 163 people, mostly in Moray, and its failure raises serious questions about how public money is invested in ambitious technology ventures and what accountability exists when they go wrong.
Chad Griffin, Geoff Rowley, and Graham Smith of FRP Advisory have been appointed as administrators after unsuccessful attempts to secure new investment or find a buyer. The administrators are now exploring options including a potential sale of assets or technology, and FRP says it is already in discussions with more than 20 interested parties, including other rocket developers.
Orbex had operations in Forres and Denmark and was one of the most high profile companies in Scotland’s nascent space industry. The ambition was to launch small satellites from the UK, a capability that would have positioned Scotland at the forefront of Europe’s commercial space sector. That ambition has now ended in the most prosaic of ways: the money ran out and nobody stepped in to provide more.
The £77 million in public funding is the number that will dominate the post mortem. For context, that is roughly what it costs to build a new secondary school. It is the kind of sum that, once spent, demands a reckoning when the outcome is administration rather than orbital launches. The questions that need answering are straightforward: who approved the investment, what milestones were set, what oversight was applied, and at what point did it become clear the company was in trouble?
Scotland’s ambitions in the space sector are not necessarily wrong. But they need to be backed by rigorous financial oversight, not just enthusiasm. Orbex’s collapse should serve as a reminder that public money spent on innovation carries risk, and that risk needs to be managed, not just accepted as the price of having grand ambitions.