Russian Private Space Tourism Company Shutting Down - CEO

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 06th April, 2021) CosmoCourse (Kosmokurs), a private Russian company developing suborbital space tourism flights, is going out of business, according to its CEO, Pavel Pushkin.

"The company is being shut down, employees have been informed about the lay off," Pushkin told Sputnik.

The company had signed a contract with the Nizhny Novgorod Region on cooperation in the project of creating the first private spaceport in Russia. Corresponding documents were submitted to Russian space agency Roscosmos for approval.

Last month, Pushkin told Sputnik that the construction of the first Russian private spaceport in the Nizhny Novgorod Region was stalled amid bureaucratic obstacles.

There were 50 space engineers working on the CosmoCourse spaceport project. They were informed about the company shutdown two months in advance.

A Roscosmos representative told Sputnik that the space agency planned to keep the CosmoCourse engineer team together and was looking for ways to get it working on other projects.

CosmoCourse received a license from Roscosmos for carrying out its space projects back in 2017. The company planned to offer tourists 15-minute flights within a group of six people and was aiming to open its private spaceport in Russia's Nizhny Novgorod Region in 2023. The first manned flight was planned for 2025.