Chapel Hill firm raises roughly $13.5M to buy stake in Elon Musk’s SpaceX

CHAPEL HILL — A fund established by Morgan Creek Capital Management to buy a stake in Elon Musk’s Space X has raised roughly $13.5 million.

The Chapel Hill-based firm closed on the round under the business name “Morgan Creek Private Opportunities, LLC Series F- SpaceX” on Thursday, according to a securities filing.

Seventy-three investors from 45 states contributed to the round, which kicked off Sept. 17.

Founded in 2012, SpaceX’s goal is to reduce space transportation costs to enable the colonization of Mars. Already, it has developed several launch vehicles, the Starlink satellite constellation, the Dragon cargo spacecraft, and flown humans to the International Space Station on the Crew Dragon Demo-2.

Last month, it reached an agreement with the US Space Force’s Space and Missile Systems Center to recover the first stage booster. In May, it also teamed up with NASA to use SpaceX’s Crew Dragon capsule for its first crewed launch in more than a decade.

Meanwhile, it’s also a busy time for Morgan Creek.

In October, it established another “Opportunities Fund” — one of several in recent months — to explore “blockchain opportunities.” Total raised: $60.9 million.

The firm is a SEC-registered investment adviser providing investment management services to institutional and qualifying clients such as endowments, pension plans, foundations and family offices.

According to its website, the firm provides “asset allocation, manager selection, and portfolio construction” based on the University Endowment Model.

It also has offices in New York and Shanghai.