off-the-wire

CORRECTED-Shares of ispace Inc untraded in Tokyo debut as buy orders overwhelm sale offers

Kitco Media
By Reuters
Published:
Updated:
Reuters
(Removes erroneous information on NASA contract in 4th paragraph of April 12 story.) By Rocky Swift TOKYO, April 12 (Reuters) - Shares of lunar transportation start-up ispace Inc went untraded in their market debut in Tokyo early on Wednesday, as bids overwhelmed offers.


The company, which has a probe already en route for the moon, raised 6.7 billion yen ($50 million) in an initial public offering (IPO). Shares of ispace were last bid at 293 yen on the Tokyo exchange's growth market, 15% above their IPO price of 254 yen.


The start-up aims to be the first commercial company to land a probe on the moon. In December its Hakuto-R Mission 1 lunar lander was launched aboard a SpaceX rocket that took off from Cape Canaveral, Florida, carrying two robotic rovers. ispace said in a statement on Wednesday it expects the lander to touch down on the moon's surface on April 26 at the earliest.


(Reporting by Rocky Swift and David Dolan; Editing by Kenneth Maxwell)

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