Virgin Australia owner Richard Branson revealed on Friday that his space tourism program, Virgin Galactic, will lift off as planned in the last quarter of 2013, with him and his family as among the first passengers.

In fact, Mr Branson and his children will among the first six persons, plus the two pilots, to ride on the SpaceShipTwo (SS2) aircraft that will be rocketed into the sky for a 60-mile journey into space.

"Next year, Holly and Sam will be joining me for a first voyage into space," the flamboyant billionaire told a crowd at the ongoing Farnborough Air Show in England.

"Going into space is a hard business ... it keeps my mind buzzing," Mr Branson added.

Others will follow suit in batches of six passengers after the maiden launch and according to Virgin Galactic, 529 people have already signed up to the expensive tour package, which comes with a price tag of $US200,000 per seat.

The two-hour flight will be launched in the New Mexico facilities of Spaceport America, where LauncherOne, another Virgin space craft set to inaugurate on 2016, will also be catapulted into space to bring into orbit small satellites.

The SS2, according to The Daily Mail, will be ferried up to attain a 50,000-feet altitude by the WhiteKnightTwo carrier aircraft from the U.S. launch site, which was constructed based on the blueprint completed by UK-based architect Lord Foster.

Then the SS2's own boosters will takeover from there, further kicking up the space craft into low earth orbit.

One of the historic trip's main attractions is for passengers to experience real weightlessness while the SS2 cabin, which would allow them to float around.

Super-rich passengers would also get a feel of riding in a space glider, the mode that SS2 will assume as its returns to base.

Rumoured as celebrity passengers to ride SS2 next year are Ashton Kutcher and Hollywood power couple, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, though no confirmation was issued by Virgin Galactic so far.

The company, however, confirmed that singer Sarah Brightman, physicist Stephen Hawking and famed X-Men director Bryan Singer will be on board on one of the initial flights for 2013.

Virgin Galactic said that it could sell as much as 700 tickets prior to Mr Branson's first SS2 blast into space.

The company also noted that with the number of people already on its list of prospective 'astronauts', Virgin Galactic is poised to outstrip the total number of persons sent into space since the first man breached that distinction.