Sir Richard Branson’s cruise-line enterprise is searching for lots of of hundreds of thousands of {dollars} in contemporary funding even because the Virgin Group founder faces monetary turbulence in different components of his enterprise empire.
Sky News has learnt that Virgin Voyages is within the early phases of plans to lift a considerable sum of cash from new and present buyers.
Sources near the scenario mentioned this weekend that it was too early to find out the size of the possible fundraising, or the combination of debt and fairness it could contain.
The disclosure of Virgin Voyages’ talks to safe new capital comes simply days after Virgin Orbit, Sir Richard’s industrial satellites enterprise, mentioned it could lay off nearly all of its workers and stop operations after operating out of cash.
He injected $11m into the enterprise this week to fund the redundancies of almost 700 workers.
Its looming collapse is a blow to the tycoon in addition to public market buyers who backed Virgin Orbit’s 2021 merger with a particular goal acquisition firm listed in New York at a valuation of over $3bn.
Virgin Voyages additionally launched in 2021 – following a 15-month delay brought on by COVID-19 – with its maiden journey from Portsmouth in August of that yr.
It operates two cruise ships – the Scarlet Lady, which sails between the US and Caribbean, and the Valiant Lady.
A 3rd vessel, the Resilient Lady, comes into operation subsequent month, with a fourth, Brilliant Lady, as a consequence of be delivered later this yr.
The firm is 20%-owned by Sir Richard’s Virgin Group, and just like the entrepreneur’s different ventures, was conceived with the intention of disrupting industries beset by an absence of innovation or focus ocustomer service.
During his many years in enterprise, Sir Richard has funded forays into banking, house tourism, aviation, insurance coverage, smooth drinks and telecoms.
Plenty of these companies, equivalent to Virgin Money and Virgin Galactic, are listed in London and New York respectively.
Others, together with Virgin Atlantic Airways, are privately held, with Sir Richard’s holding firm proudly owning important stakes.
The pandemic badly harm Virgin’s shopper and leisure-focused firms, prompting the tycoon at one level to warn that he could also be compelled to mortgage his Necker Island house.
He has raised billions of {dollars} from the sale of shares in Virgin Galactic, utilizing a part of the proceeds to fund capital injections into Virgin Atlantic and Virgin Orbit.
Some of these share gross sales got here throughout a interval when he additionally sought emergency monetary help from the federal government to shore up his airline enterprise.
Virgin Voyages’ newest talks about elevating funding come simply seven months after it secured $550m from buyers led by funds managed by BlackRock, the world’s largest asset supervisor.
“Despite the unprecedented challenges the cruise sector has faced in the past few years, the industry is exhibiting a powerful rebound,” Brendan Galloway, director at BlackRock Global Credit mentioned on the time.
“We are excited to invest in Virgin Voyages on behalf of our investors as we see a positive outlook and impressive growth on the horizon for the company.”
Bain Capital, the personal fairness agency, and Virgin Group additionally participated in that spherical.
Its adult-only journeys sail to 100 ports, together with in Australia and New Zealand from later this yr.
Among the accolades cited by Virgin Voyages throughout its first 18 months in operation are recognition on Condé Nast Traveler’s 2022 Cruising ‘Hot List’, and being named finest new cruise ship by Cruise Critic.
This yr, the corporate says it has seen “exponential growth in bookings, including industry leading re-bookings, from customers”.
A Virgin Voyages spokeswoman declined to touch upon its funding discussions.
Source: information.sky.com”