Virgin Orbit halts all its operations from Thursday

Virgin Orbit has paused its operations and furloughed its workforce for a week as it looks for a funding lifeline, the company made the announcement on Thursday after the first satellite mission from UK soil failed to reach orbit earlier this year.

Chief executive Dan Hart told staff in a meeting on Wednesday that the furlough was intended to buy Virgin Orbit time to finalise a new investment plan, as the staff are expected to be updated next week.

Virgin Orbit was founded in 2017 after spinning off from its sister company, Virgin Galactic, which is focused on using supersonic planes to vault high-paying tourists on joy rides to the edge of space.