Virgin Galactic hires Jayanta Jenkins as first head of brand and marketing

Space: marketing’s final frontier. Jayanta Jenkins has been named head of brand and marketing for Virgin Galactic Holdings, the first commercial space travel company. The marketing alum of companies including Disney, Samsung and Twitter will be the first to hold the position at Virgin Galactic.

“From the age of seven to 18, I spent almost every other weekend at the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum in Washington D.C. (and the National Gallery of Art – East Wing),” Jenkins told Ad Age via email. “I spent a lot of my early, formative years studying the history and technological advances of different space programs both here in the U.S. and in Russia and China, so my interest in space has been something that’s evolved and grown over my life.”

He added, “Let’s just say growing up I wished I had been from the planet Vulcan!”

Jenkins will oversee the aerospace company’s marketing strategy, inclusive of advertising, partnerships, publicity, digital content and media. He will report to Blair Rich, Virgin Galactic’s president and chief business officer, commercial and consumer operations.

“As we prepare to launch commercial space flight service next year, having visionary, proven marketing talent in place to tell our story and communicate our one-of-a-kind experiential product to global audiences is key,” said Rich in a statement.

Prior to assuming the cosmic marketing role on Nov. 7, Jenkins served as executive VP, head of content marketing for Disney Branded Television and National Geographic Content, overseeing marketing and publicity for the two branches of content on Disney+ and linear networks.

In addition to his two-year tenure at the House of Mouse, Jenkins has held top creative titles at Samsung’s in-house agency, Cheil Worldwide, Apple’s Beats by Dre and Twitter, where he was the social media company’s first global head of creative. Jenkins began his career in the agency world, working at TBWA\Chiat Day, Wieden+Kennedy and The Martin Agency.

“It is a dream. It is a new category,” said Jenkins, who added that he would love to journey to outer space himself. “Brands I have led—like Twitter, Apple/Beats by Dre, Nike, Disney—these have all been category leaders and they all share an important common theme: they all work to bring people together through culture and to create new, shared experiences.”

Virgin Galactic conducted its first fully staffed space flight in July 2021, and recently released a timeline for launching commercial voyages in the second quarter of 2023 after final rounds of test flights in the first quarter. Tickets are expected to cost $450,000.

Virgin Galactic founder Richard Branson currently faces legal hurdles, as he may have to face shareholders in court who allege that the billionaire defrauded investors into buying inflated shares and withheld details about issues in the company’s progress, Reuters reported this week. Virgin Galactic shares are trading below $5; in 2021, they were as high as $55.91.