Theia Group Inc., a satellite company with ambitions to bring 1,000 jobs to a leased plot of land near Albuquerque International Sunport, is vacating an airport facility in Statesville, North Carolina, cutting short a four-year lease after less than one year.
The manager of the Statesville airport told Albuquerque Business First on May 20 that Theia had given verbal notice that it was exiting the facility and that the company owed two months' rent.
"They have given me notice that they’re leaving," said John Ferguson, airport manager, adding that the company did not give a reason. "They’re just a little behind [on monthly rent payments] right now, but I’ve been told they will get it caught up here very shortly."
In June 2020, Theia Group entered into a lease agreement with the city of Statesville for a hangar at Statesville Regional Airport. The commencement date on the lease was March 1, 2020, but it wasn't signed until three months later.
The company had originally planned to buy or lease as many as six "Jetstream turbo prop aircraft" and as many as five "Gulfstream jets," according to the Statesville City Council. But the company only brought two planes to the hangar . Currently, it owes about $31,000 in back rent and is in the process of vacating the facility, Ferguson said. The lease was worth $15,541.98 per month in rent, or $186,503.73 per year.
The news comes as the final touches are put on a ground lease and development agreement between the City of Albuquerque and Theia Group for a 114-acre plot of land near the Sunport and Kirtland Air Force Base. Theia plans to build the Orion Center there, a multibillion-dollar development where satellites would be assembled and tested. The agreement has not been signed but the city is "looking to start the final process" this week, according to Lorena Sanchez, a spokeswoman for Mayor Tim Keller's office.
In a statement to Business First, Theia spokeswoman Susan Davis said that "the [Statesville] hangar was moved to another state" for "classified" reasons and that the decision has "no relevance to Orion." She declined to disclose where the operations were moved to or what the Statesville hanger had been used for.
The company owns two aircraft — a 1944 Douglas DC3C-S1C3G and a 1996 Jetstream 4101 — according to Federal Aviation Administration records.
In an October declaration — as part of an ongoing trademark suit against the company — CEO and cofounder Erlend Olson disclosed that the startup provides "selected sovereign nations" with data analysis collected via aircraft. Those nations would then later transition to Theia's satellite network as part of its "early adopter program." The company eventually plans to launch a network of satellites to gather planetary imagery and data that it says could be used for national security, emergency services, infrastructure analysis and more.
Meanwhile, Theia Group has steadily expanded in Albuquerque, previously taking over about 175,000 square feet of space formerly occupied by Raytheon. Co. Group Orion, a subsidiary of Theia Group, plans to build a workforce of about 300 employees at the Sandia Science & Technology Park, according to a May newsletter from the SSTP, where the facilities are located.
As of March, the company had position openings in Albuquerque that appeared on job boards.
The pending ground lease and development agreement for the site near the Sunport, on the other hand, is more consequential. The proposed lease has an initial term of 30 years, with options to extend to 50 years, and would cost the company $2 million to cover the first four years. Beginning in 2025, the lease would cost Theia Group $1.24 million per year in rent, which will increase at 2% per year for four years before being set by appraisal.
Theia Group must develop about 95 acres by 2029 and all remaining acres by 2031. The city could reclaim any undeveloped parts of the site if it determines the milestones are not met, as well as adjust the cost of rent, according to the proposed agreement, which was unanimously approved by city council last month.
The company's plans for Albuquerque are massive in both size and cost. Site plans approved by the city's Environmental Planning Commission in November call for millions of square feet of manufacturing, assembly and office space. And the construction costs for the Orion Center are estimated to be between $8 billion to $10 billion throughout the next decade, according to a 2020 research report from commercial real estate firm Colliers International.
Theia Group VP James Reid Gorman told Business First in November that the initial assembly facility at the Orion Center would need "at least" 1,000 workers, which would make the company one of the larger private employers in the state, according to data from the New Mexico Partnership. The current size of the company's workforce is unknown — Davis previously told Business First that "questions on employees and hiring are proprietary" — but it was approved for a $2.7 million Paycheck Protection Program loan for 131 jobs last year, according to Small Business Administration data.
In addition to the pending finalization of the lease with the city, project plans must also be approved by the city's Development Review Board. Gorman previously said "we have to get the full approval of the project in order to unlock financing which is lined up."
Sunport spokesman Jonathan Small told Business First in March that a site plan, site infrastructure list and plat would be submitted in April with final DRB approval in June.
