TAMPA, Fla. — Terran Orbital will address shareholder concerns about its growth prospects in a virtual town hall event Oct. 26 during what is normally a quiet period for a public company just weeks away from announcing earnings.
“That is an out-of-the-box idea to try to enhance communications,” CEO and chairman Marc Bell told in an Oct. 25 interview.
The town hall comes amid calls from among the small satellite maker’s minority investors for management changes to reverse declining shares. Those changes include replacing Bell as CEO and separating the chairman and CEO roles.
Bell said the town hall event has nothing to do with an Oct. 11 letter from investors collectively holding 8.4% of Terran Orbital — including three engineers who co-founded its primary operating subsidiary Tyvak, which called for leadership changes along with a strategic review to enhance market credibility.
“It has to do with my stock price being under $1 and folks not understanding what’s happening here,” Bell continued.
The Latest York Stock Exchange warned Boca Raton, Florida-headquartered Terran Orbital Oct. 20 it could be booted off the general public market if it doesn’t have a median closing share price of no less than $1 over a calendar month in the course of the next six months.
Terran Orbital’s shares fell below the $1 mark a month ago and closed at $0.83 Oct. 25, after declining from around $10 soon after its market debut in March 2022.
The manufacturer began trading shares after merging with a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC), a financial vehicle for rushing businesses to the general public market that has proved controversial within the space industry. Other space firms that went public via SPAC mergers are also underperforming as a few of them have wildly missed their revenue projections.
In accordance with Bell, Terran Orbital’s poor stock performance is partly as a result of investors linking the corporate to other space firms which have merged with a SPAC, despite significant differences of their businesses.
“We’re still stuck on this newspace SPAC world,” he said, “and most of those newspace SPAC firms aren’t going to last, aren’t going to survive — and we’re thriving.”
More visibility
Terran Orbital expects to get $180 million this yr alone for early work to construct satellites for Rivada Space, the manufacturer said during its last earnings leads to August, as a part of a $2.4 billion contract that is still largely under wraps.
Bell said he goals to provide shareholders more transparency around this and other large contract wins to enhance its standing within the equity market, which might give the corporate more opportunities for raising funds.
Recently, Terran Orbital also announced a deal to construct 36 satellite buses for Lockheed Martin, and a $4.7 million contract Oct. 25 with the European Space Agency for a proximity operations and in-orbit servicing mission.
The town hall event, scheduled Oct. 26 at 3 p.m. Eastern, is open to the general public and can include a financial, operational, and strategic update, but is not going to cover quarterly financial results that may as an alternative be a part of the corporate’s earnings announcement Nov. 14.
“The thought is to enhance communications between us and our shareholders,” Bell said, “realizing we live in a day and an age of easy gratification.”
This features a Q&A session with Terran Orbital management that he said is open to all shareholders, including the group of minority investors led by financial services firm Sophis Investments looking for structural changes at the corporate.
A spokesperson for these minority investors, which calls itself the Concerned Investor Group, said Terran Orbital has not responded to requests for a gathering to debate their concerns.
Terran Orbital’s board of independent directors issued a letter Oct. 19 to shareholders to underline its continued support for Bell and Terran Orbital’s management following the Concerned Investor Group’s letter.
Terran Orbital’s management, board of directors, and direct investors that include Lockheed Martin control greater than 50% of Terran Orbital’s stock, and the Concerned Investor Group doesn’t have the equity power to force change at the corporate.
Along with Sophis and its affiliates, the Concerned Investor Group includes Tyvak co-founders Austin Williams, Roland Coelho, and Jordi Puig-Suari.
California-based Tyvak (Tyvak Nano Satellite Systems) was founded in 2011 and was sold to Terran Orbital in 2014. Terran Orbital phased out the Tyvak brand to reflect a transition from constructing nanosats and cubesats to larger satellites.
Williams was one in every of no less than three senior engineers and program executives who left the corporate in late 2022 following disagreements over its direction.