AN ENNIS NATIVE has joined a space company as its new strategic advisor.
Aviation entrepreneur Dómhnal Slattery has joined SpinLaunch, a pioneering space company as a strategic advisor, having recently participated in the company’s Series B investment round.
Founder and CEO of SpinLaunch, Jonathan Yaney confirmed the addition of Slattery to their team and said his three decades of financial and business leadership will help them advance its commitment to commercializing end-to-end space solutions across launch, satellites, and services.
He stated, “Dómhnal Slattery’s passion and dedication to innovation, strategic growth, and sustainability makes him a natural fit for SpinLaunch. With his proven business leadership, track record as a founder and commitment to purpose-driven initiatives, Dómhnal will accelerate our global commercialization efforts and strengthen our leadership position as the trusted provider of innovative space solutions”.
Founded by Yaney in 2014, SpinLaunch which has its headquarters in California, is building a ground-based, electric-powered mass accelerator launch system that can deliver a substantially less expensive and environmentally sustainable way to place constellations of small satellites into Low Earth Orbit (LEO). In the last year, SpinLaunch has also created a new product line of small satellite buses in the 20kg-200 kg size class that complements our low-cost and high-cadence approach to space, and meets upcoming LEO constellation needs.
Dómhnal remarked, “This is one of the most exciting and innovative companies I have seen in my three decades in the global aerospace industry”. He said Jonathan’s vision and ambition for space was “unmatched. SpinLaunch’s end-to-end space solutions are poised to revolutionize the entire space economy, while also driving decarbonization in the sector as we transition to a net zero world”.
Last July, Slattery confirmed that he was stepping down as CEO of Avolon. He founded the company in 2010 and oversaw its growth from the largest private equity backed start-up globally in 2010 to becoming the world’s second largest aircraft lessor with a balance sheet in excess of $30 billion.
In November, he was appointed a special adviser to Abu Dhabi-based agritech business Pure Harvest Smart Farms. The company is focused on the year-round sustainable production of fruit and vegetables in the tough desert environment. It’s behind the Middle East’s first commercial-scale, semi-automated high-tech growing system.
Slattery is also the non-executive chairman of New York-listed Vertical Aerospace, a developer of electric air taxis that has hundreds of advance orders from global airlines. Last year, he established a new company, Clahane Capital which he is CEO of, he has been joined at that business by Yvonne Gallagher, who is vice president of operations. She is a former Avolon senior executive.
