Former RapidEye AG Chief Executive Wolfgang Bieder-mann remembers the day a large Chinese delegation arrived in Brandenburg, Germany, to try to purchase his struggling company and its five in-orbit Earth observation satellites. The time was mid-2011 and RapidEye's financial backers had decided to file for the German equivalent of the U.S. Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. RapidEye's satellites, launched in mid-2008, were in good health, but the company's owners were worried that its debt load was more than advisable. The bankruptcy proceedings, they reasoned, would allow a fresh start under new ownership.
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