Putting a Manx on the Moon without subsidy

Who would have thought that one of the centres for the new space industry was the Isle of Man. An unprepossessing island in the Irish Sea, outside the boundaries of Europe and one of the few well-regulated, low-tax jurisdictions remaining on the planet. Why would anyone ever want to site business there?

Art Dula, chief executive officer of Excalibur Almaz Limited, the Isle of Man based space tourism company focused on returning to the moon, said: "The Isle of Man is the leading venue for the world's growing commercial space industry.

"Regulatory and insurance support from the Isle of Man Government for orbital space tourism has been a great help to our business."

The Manx nation has now been rated as the fifth most likely to land a man on the Moon, ahead of those dynamic innovators, the European Union.

As Jim Bennett has noted before, European co-operation remains a crock for harnessing entrepreneurial activities within Newspace:

Mr Bennett, president of Wyoming Aerospace LLC, added: "You don't need astronauts to have a successful space programme. The New Space environment now offers British entrepreneurs, financiers and scientists to take a seat at the main table on their own terms."

He added: "Britain has networks of close ties, experiences and mutual trust not just in one direction but in three: Europe, the USA and the Commonwealth.

"It should seek to maintain its existing productive ties with Europe, exploit the ease of business between the US and Britain to develop New Space entrepreneurship, and enhance its co-operation with the often-underestimated capabilities of Canada, Australia, and India."

Pointless in attracting the attention of the UK space agency.Or the subsidy junkies currently masquerading at the forefront of the UK 'commercial' private sector space industry:

Certainly, it’s easy to imagine a conservative-minded bank getting cold feet over the risk of investing in so much unproven technology and a novel business plan. [Sir Martin]Sweeting argues that the funding he received got the company ‘over the hump’ and into a state where it could exploit a growing market.

It is also possible to imagine a UK space agency pouring vast amounts of taxpayer money down a black hole.