(Reuters) -Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin and private equity firm Cerberus are among companies that have shown interest in buying rocket company United Launch Alliance (ULA), the Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday, citing sources familiar with the matter.
Lockheed Martin and Boeing have equal ownership in ULA, which makes one of the launch vehicles for Amazon.com’s satellite internet network, Kuiper.
Business jet maker Textron has also expressed interest in ULA, the report said adding that a bidding price could not be determined and a deal may not materialize.
“If I were buying a space business, I’d go look at ULA,” its CEO Tory Bruno told Bloomberg News in October.
ULA has faced delays in the development of its new rocket named Vulcan Centaur, which will carry Astrobotic’s Peregrine lunar lander in its first launch in January. Blue Origin’s BE-4 engine powers the spacecraft’s first stage.
Private equity firms have been showing interest in space companies that have exposure to government contracts, a segment dominated by Elon Musk’s SpaceX.
The U.S. Space Force has assigned 21 launches to SpaceX and ULA worth about $2.5 billion, CNBC reported in November, with the Boeing-Lockheed Martin joint venture receiving 11 missions valued at $1.3 billion.
Blue Origin, Cerberus, Textron and the joint owners of ULA – Boeing and Lockheed Martin – did not immediately respond to Reuters’ requests for comment.
(Reporting by Akash Sriram in Bengaluru; Editing by Anil D’Silva and Arun Koyyur)
