Rendering of a BlackSky satellite. Photo: BlackSky

BlackSky reported $34.1 million in revenue for 2021 in its second-ever quarterly financials since going public through a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) merger last year. 

The $34.1 million in revenue was a 61% increase from the prior year, and at the top of BlackSky’s lowered guidance from Nov. 2021. The previous revenue forecast was $40 million. The company said the increase in revenue in 2021 was primarily due to several new government contract awards.

Operating expenses were $119.5 million, which included $38.4 million of non-cash stock-based compensation expense related to specific pre-merger equity awards to key employees as part of the business combination, $18.4 million of satellite impairment charges taken in the second quarter, and $5.8 million of public company transaction costs.

Capital expenditures for the full year 2021 totaled $63.9 million.

For the full year 2021, operating loss was $120.1 million compared to an operating loss of $41.4 million in 2021. BlackSky attributed the increase in operating loss to higher non-recurring operating expenses, investments in sales, software, and engineering hires, recurring public company operating costs, and higher depreciation expense.

Fourth quarter revenue was $11.5 million, up 79% from the fourth quarter of 2020

“We’re pleased that our fourth quarter revenue improved significantly over the prior year period driven by increased customer demand for our platform,” said CEO Brian O’Toole. “In the fourth quarter, we won multiple U.S. and international government contracts, established new commercial agreements with [Forbes] Global 2000 companies, and expanded our global reseller network. We dramatically improved the revisit rate of our high-resolution satellite constellation after launching six additional satellites, bringing the current constellation to 12 satellites as of year-end, which we believe is more than sufficient capacity to achieve our company’s objectives for the foreseeable future.” 

The company expects 2022 revenue to be between $58 million and $62 million, a 76% increase over 2021 at the mid-point of this range. This is a much lower projection than BlackSky originally projected in its SPAC announcement. At the time, the company was expecting revenue to jump to $114 million in 2022. 

In addition, BlackSky expects to launch an additional four satellites in the first half of 2022, two of which will replace the first satellites launched years ago as these assets reach the end of their design life, bringing the total to 14 operating satellites.