The United States demanded that a Ukrainian entrepreneur sell his stake in an American company

The US government has demanded that Ukrainian entrepreneur Maxim Polyakov sell his stake in the missile company Firefly Aerospace. This is necessary for US national security. But Polyakov's representatives believe that the real reason is the tension between Ukraine and Russia. Writes about it Hromadske.

Photo: Shutterstock

At the end of November, the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States sent a letter to Polyakov with concerns about national security. It said that the Ukrainian entrepreneur and his investment company Noosphere Venture Partners should sell about half of the shares of Firefly Aerospace.

Representatives of the American government and the aerospace industry oppose Polyakov's control over the company, which he has supported for several years, because they fear that valuable technology may end up in Ukraine, Russia or another country developing its own rocket program, writes with the BBC.

Polyakov's representatives said that the entrepreneur agreed with the requirements, but added that owning Firefly did not threaten US national security.

“Today, Noosphere Ventures (a company founded by Max Polyakov) announced that it intends to engage an investment banking firm to assist in the sale of Noosphere Ventures’ stake in Firefly Aerospace,” Polyakov’s company said in a statement. “Although Ukraine is a U.S. ally, its conflict with Russia has heightened concerns about what might happen to valuable technologies within the country.”

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According to Bloomberg sources, the US government has suspended ongoing operations to launch Firefly missiles in Vandenberg, California, as "Polyakov's property problem is escalating."

Polyakov's investment company insists that he passed a thorough check and found no security problems. The company is convinced that the actions of the US committee are due to the tension between Ukraine and Russia. Noosphere Ventures says it is working hard to resolve issues with the committee in the most efficient way possible.

Although Polyakov has invested more than $ 200 million of his own money in Firefly, he agreed at the end of 2020 to step down from the board of directors and refuse to participate in the day-to-day activities of Firefly, in order to make it easier for the company to obtain US government and military contracts, and also to ease tensions.

Firefly Aerospace

It is a privately held aerospace company providing space transportation services. It was created on the basis of Firefly Space Systems, which was bought and restarted in 2017 by Maxim Polyakov, a Ukrainian entrepreneur and founder of Noosphere Ventures.

The company develops light transport vehicles for delivering cargo to low-earth orbit. Its main office is located in the USA, and the research and development centers of the enterprise are located in Dnipro.

In September 2021, the company launched the Alpha launch vehicle for the first time. However, during the ascent in the first stage, it experienced certain anomalies and exploded.

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The two-stage ultra-light rocket is capable of launching a payload weighing up to 1000 kilograms into low-earth orbit. The company noted that the rocket is intended specifically for commercial launches of small satellites, and the delivery cost per kilogram of cargo is the lowest among the missiles of this class.

According to Polyakov, he dreamed of turning Firefly into a large aerospace company that could benefit both the United States and Ukraine.

“Firefly hoped that the company's best engineers from the United States and Ukraine could join forces and create a fleet of large rockets capable of launching many satellites into orbit and then going to the Moon. According to Polyakov, he wanted the United States to gain access to Ukrainian experience while finding a way to improve the prospects of Ukrainian aerospace engineers,” the company said in a statement.

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