For many years, space tourism has been a blossoming industry, stimulating development and financial investments for many companies. Much of the research and studies of the past decades has begun to come to fruition, as many of these companies begin to plan their first launches of manned vehicles.

Virgin Galactic is poised to begin launching private space flight. Sir Richard Branson is utilizing the basic design of the winner of the X-Prize and developing SpaceShipTwo. The company is currently taking reservations for the first flights and testing the vehicles.