SPACE.com has the news that Richard Branson and his Virgin Galactic venture have announced the location of the new $25M spaceport for space tourism…

… off Exit 32 from Interstate 25. That’s where the Southwestern Regional Spaceport in Upham, New Mexico is to be built.

Upham is roughly 45 miles north of Las Cruces and 30 miles east of Truth or Consequences. The now barren stretch of land that will become the spaceport covers some 27 square miles, having a north-south configuration.

(Too bad for BransonBlog reader Robert Jacobson that they didn’t go with his Mojave suggestion. He did manage to deliver his presentation and hire-me pitch to Branson at the recent store opening in LA, though… Impressive!)

Branson also unveiled the new Virgin Galactic logo, which is based on a photo of Branson’s own eye. Very interesting. I love the logo, but I’m not sure it’s the best one for space tourism. Who knows… Time will tell. Glad to see things are moving forward on the Galactic front.

Hi everyone… We’re a bit back-logged with Branson news here, while also working to upgrade the site to our new 2.0 version this month. But with the Superbowl in the US tomorrow, we had to take a moment to point out how Sir Richard not only appears in his first Superbowl ad, but also — in his usual style — got someone else to pay for it too:

While Web tie-ins are hardly a new concept, this year’s Super Bowl entrants are upping the ante in cost and creativity.

Volvo is offering a chance to win a trip into space aboard Virgin Galactic, the brainchild of billionaire Richard Branson, who also appears in the carmaker’s commercial.

Volvo is asking aspiring astronauts to log onto www.boldlygo.com through Feb. 22. The price tag for the sub-orbital flight: $200,000.

If you’re a pure marketing play like Virgin Group, you know you’ve arrived when other companies line up to pay for your marketing. "Galactic will put the Virgin brand on the American map in a way money can’t buy," Virgin strategist Will Whitehorn has previously said. Even better when you’re talking about other people’s money at that.

While Wired’s new cover story has obviously taken the prize in terms of current Virgin Galactic coverage, BBC News also had a story recently with some interesting details about the new spaceship itself. [Read more]

Happy New Year! We at BransonBlog.com want to wish all of you a wonderful 2005… May it be your best year ever. The tragic events in Asia this past week have given us all even more reason to pause and count our blessings. To no one’s surprise, Richard is donating £50,000 and flying in needed supplies, as well as soliciting charity donations from Virgin airline passengers as they’ve always done. In a time when so many other companies, including many with factories in the area, have been silent about committing aid, it’s incredibly inspiring to see Virgin rise to the occasion to help. And when you run a few international airlines, you’re uniquely positioned to bring supplies and relief into the area better than most other organizations. Very well done, Richard… thank you.

On a cheerier note, what better way to ring in the New Year than by Wired dedicating its first cover of 2005 to our favorite billionaire? Their new story about Virgin Galactic is more detailed than the usual fare and well worth the time. (There’s even an interesting page at the end listing various Virgin companies with annual revenue figures.) There’s far too much here to quote, so you really should just go read the whole article. But for the busy Branson fan on the go, here are some highlights… [Read more]

KenInfinite discusses into how FAA jurisdiction over commercial space flights would work.

A bill that strives to create a regulatory framework for space tourism passed in the U.S. House of Representatives on Saturday, after a contentious debate over its safety provisions

Where is the line between courage and folly? How much protection should the government afford its citizens if it might be the cost of a dream? Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, R-Calif., sponsor of the latest version of the bill, said, "After being informed of the risks, people can and should be able to decide to buy a ticket and achieve their lifelong dream of flying into space even though they know that it is a risky proposition."

Sounds reasonable to me, and presumably to the thousands of people who have already paid deposits to Virgin Galactic without waiting for legislation.

Still trying to catch up with a backlog of Branson news, plus some operations work as well— We’ve moved to a new hosting provider, so drop us an email at editors @ if you notice any weirdness. In last week’s news, though, Sigourney Weaver is apparently the latest celebrity aspiring astronaut, according to the UK tabloid, The Sun (which admittedly seems like a pretty sketchy source to be quoting here, except that XPrizeNews also quoted them).

Weaver, 55, told aides to contact the company and book her a £115,000 seat on Virgin’s "VSS Enterprise" craft, based on Burt Rutan’s X-Prize winning SpaceShipOne. A Virgin spokesperson confirmed that first contact had been made, and added: "We’d be delighted to take Sigourney back to visit the Aliens."

Hopefully the VSS Enterprise has airlocks well-designed for blowing aliens back out into space. And with Sigourney Weaver, William Shatner, and a few more sci-fi icons, you could put together one hell of a sci-fi themed space cruise.

The Space Review has an interview with Burt Rutan, genius designer of SpaceShipOne and the new Virgin Galactic fleet. Also mentioned, of course, is his new business partner…

I did not think that there would be a major investment by a major guy who can and will do it. Can anyone here think of a better guy that will actually go out and build a spaceline [than Richard Branson]? I couldn’t.

Exactly what I thought too. This really is the best possible team for such an ambitious undertaking.

People all over the place are pointing to the news that Captain Kirk wants to ride the VSS Enterprise:

The "Star Trek" star is among more than 7,000 people who have told Richard Branson they would gladly pay him $210,000 (£115,000) for a trip aboard his planned spacecraft, the entrepreneur said Friday.

With an Emmy last year for a guest role, a starring role in this season’s spin-off, and even a new CD, 73-year-old William Shatner seems to be doing great. Now if only he could book his Virgin Galactic ticket on Priceline.com.  

BusinessWeek has an article on Virgin Galactic, with a few more details than I’ve seen elsewhere:

Branson’s dream has been in the making since at least 1995. But it wasn’t until two days before SpaceShipOne’s first X-Prize-winning flight on Sept. 29 that Virgin announced its timeline for developing space tourism. The $21.5 million deal with Paul Allen’s Mojave Aerospace Ventures (the company that funded designer Rutan and owns the rights to SpaceShipOne), allows Virgin to build as many as five souped-up versions of the initial prototype SpaceShipOne.

Nice, five souped-up spaceships, aiming at up to 104 flights per year. Also, the first ship is to be called the VSS Enterprise. Now they just need to get Captain Kirk on board the maiden voyage.

Looks like Sir Richard has once again demonstrated his brilliant insights into what people want (the hallmark of Virgin Group success, I think).

Would-be astronauts also have shown up at Virgin’s London office with checks in hand, he added. The cost for the two-hour flight, five minutes of which will be spent weightless, hovering above Earth, is approximately $190,000.

"We had about 185 people come to our office. One of them was Trevor Beattie, creative director for TBWA. That’s one of the largest advertising agencies in the United Kingdom. He showed up at our office with a check, and we said we weren’t accepting checks yet," Whitehorn said.

It’s official! The Mojave Aerospace team led by the visionary Burt Rutan successfully completed its second launch attempt in a week, reaching an altitude of 368,000 feet and winning the $10 million Ansari X Prize. Of course, being a Branson fan, I was also particularly amused by the brilliant 11th-hour marketing move on Sir Richard’s part. [Read more]

So, it’s official… The mid-1990s trademarks for Virgin Galactic — nice play on the Virgin Atlantic moniker — have finally been leveraged with Burt Rutan’s technological genius into a new commercial space tourism venture, announced today in London by Sir Richard himself… [Read more]