Latest Tokyo Brief coverage on Astroscale Holdings Inc., tracking filings, financial news, and market signals from Japan.
TSE:186A
Astroscale's UK subsidiary signed a £15mn multiyear contract with the Ministry of Defence, but the deal sits outside the forecast for the year to April 2027, and its effect on guidance is still under review.
Astroscale France will earn €13.2mn, about ¥2.36bn, through 2030 as subcontractor to Exotrail on a CNES-backed mission to deorbit a Eutelsat OneWeb satellite, the unit's first paying contract.
A more-than-doubled quarterly net loss and a lost UK debris-removal tender didn't stop Astroscale from lifting cash to ¥34.95bn, up from ¥10.02bn, after a ¥30.6bn bond-and-share raise, with full-year loss guidance left unchanged.
Astroscale's Japanese unit has signed Isar Aerospace to launch ADRAS-J2, a mission to capture and deorbit a three-tonne rocket stage around the year to April 2028, and the ¥12bn contract was already assumed in the group's earnings guidance, so it adds nothing new to the numbers.
Astroscale Holdings has extended its unsecured overdraft facility with Mizuho Bank to June 2029 at the same ¥3bn limit, but the deal requires the loss-making satellite-servicing company to keep at least ¥5bn in cash and near-cash assets on hand at all times.
Astroscale plans to cut stated capital by ¥2.13bn and drain its entire ¥5.60bn capital reserve to wipe out a ¥7.73bn accumulated deficit, an accounting shuffle that leaves shareholders' stakes and the company's net worth unchanged.
Astroscale's board wants inside directors to earn new stock awards over four years, not one, and can claw the shares back if misconduct triggers a restated audit.
Project revenue rose 89.0% to ¥11.51 billion and IFRS revenue climbed 141.8% to ¥5.94 billion in the year to April, while operating loss narrowed to ¥9.98 billion and net loss to ¥6.70 billion. Cash and equivalents fell to ¥10.02 billion from ¥21.30 billion, and the coming-year outlook is still a loss-making range rather than a clean turn to profit.