Currently, the best luck has been with individual wealthy backers or founders. All the companies I worked for that had even moderate success were backed mostly by one far-sighted individual (a different one each time). The problems arose when costs exceeded what the individual could muster, and we had to try and get other investors in.

The main problem we had getting other investors at Rotary Rocket was that at the time we were competing with skyrocketing tech stocks for capital, and who wants a return on investment ten years down the road when Wossname.com will double your cash in a year?

Most of the most successful current attempts to build private space endeavors were and are still driven by millionaire angels, including Armadillo, Beal, SpaceX, Rutan's work, and Blue Origin, among others.

Deep pockets are a definite plus in this business, and I'm fairly confident that one or more of these efforts will succeed. I'm cheering them ALL on.