Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin plans to send tourists into space in 2018, but the company is also targeting more ambitious goals like mining asteroids.
Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon and founder of Blue Origin, has set out to make space travel a reality. He is targeting bigger goals than just getting humans into orbit.
Jeff Bezos’ ambitions for space go well beyond the brief visit he will make on Tuesday.
Over the last two decades, the founder of Amazon.com Inc. AMZN -1.59 percent has spent billions on his Blue Origin LLC space enterprise, believing that mankind must eventually build outposts across the solar system.
More immediately, Morgan Stanley estimates that Mr. Bezos’ firm would seek business in a space industry that will quadruple in size to more than $1 trillion in annual revenues by 2040 if fast technical advances allow regular lunar landings, asteroid mining, and space tourism.
The crew capsule of the Blue Origin. Years have been spent creating rockets, engines, and vehicles by the firm.
Blue Origin (photo)
Mr. Bezos will take his own big leap when Blue Origin launches him and three other people into space in an 11-minute trip, the company’s first with passengers on its New Shepard rocket.
A successful mission may help Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic Holdings Inc gain momentum in the growing space travel industry. The larger issue for Blue Origin is securing the sort of big government contracts that offer a consistent income stream and give businesses that acquire them credibility. Space Exploration Technologies Corp., the official name for Elon Musk’s SpaceX, has won those contracts ahead of Blue Origin.
Blue Origin has been expanding its activities and creating a portfolio of rockets, engines, and vehicles for many years. Mr. Bezos has characterized his enthusiasm for space as the driving force behind this effort. In talks, he has mentioned the Apollo 11 moon-landing mission as a formative experience for him, as well as science-fiction authors Arthur C. Clarke and scientist and novelist Carl Sagan.
The launch of a New Shepard rocket.
Blue Origin (photo)
“If we were out in the solar system, we could have a trillion people, which would imply a thousand Mozarts and a thousand Einsteins. Mr. Bezos remarked in a speech two years ago, “This would be an amazing civilisation.” Mr. Bezos has said that Blue Origin can reduce the cost of space missions in part by creating reusable rockets.
The Amazon founder’s words have been accompanied by significant cash pledges. Mr. Bezos said that he sells $1 billion in Amazon shares every year to finance Blue Origin.
Mr. Bezos started collecting hundreds of thousands of acres of land in West Texas for Blue Origin in the early part of the decade after establishing the business in 2000, telling a local newspaper in 2005 that he intended to construct a rocket launchpad on the site.
The business now has facilities in Florida, California, Alabama, and Washington, D.C., as well as headquarters outside of Seattle, in addition to the Texas launch site. It employs about 3,500 employees, including Chief Executive Bob Smith, who formerly worked at Honeywell International Inc.’s aerospace division. Blue Origin is a privately held company that does not disclose financial information.
According to Howard McCurdy, an American University professor who has written on space and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Mr. Bezos is “doing what he did with Amazon, which is to roll over every cent he could obtain into capital equipment and innovation.”
On Sunday, Richard Branson became the first person to fly to the edge of space, and Jeff Bezos isn’t far behind. However, the spacecraft, flight logistics, and altitudes of the two wealthy founders vary. Laura Kammermann is the illustrator behind this image.
Following Tuesday’s launch, Blue Origin plans to perform two more passenger flights on the New Shepard this year, officials announced at a press conference on Sunday. Mr. Smith did not say how much the business charges for tickets.
“Payment willingness is still very strong. He said, “Our early flights are going for a really fair price.”
Outside of the burgeoning space tourism industry, SpaceX has established a stronger relationship with Washington’s space agencies. According to a government spending database, NASA and the Pentagon have spent $2.8 billion on 52 prime contracts won by the business headed by Mr. Musk during the last 14 federal fiscal years. During that time, they have spent $496.5 million on 33 contracts won by Blue Origin.
Blue Origin did not answer to queries about its intentions for collaborating with government agencies or its rivalry with SpaceX. Mr. Smith has previously said that the firm wishes to engage with such clients.
The two firms are squabbling over a contract to construct a lunar lander for a 2024 mission. On July 20, 1969, the Apollo 11 lunar lander landed on the moon, the same day as Mr. Bezos’ planned space mission on Tuesday. The lander contract was granted to SpaceX in April, but Blue Origin filed a complaint with the US Government Accountability Office, which may result in NASA rebidding the deal.
By August 4, the accountability agency is scheduled to make a judgment on Blue Origin’s case. Leidos Holdings Inc.’s Dynetics subsidiary also competed for the lander and lodged a complaint.
According to statistics from the Federal Aviation Administration covering permitted launches, SpaceX is currently the most prolific launcher, having launched 23 rockets so far this year. Blue Origin, which has conducted nine such launches since late 2017, also uses reusable rockets to reduce the cost of getting to space.
Blue Origin, according to Marco Cáceres, a space expert at aerospace research company Teal Group, “has to have a track record.”
With a six-person gumdrop-shaped capsule and windows spanning 3.5 feet by 2.3 feet along its sides, the New Shepard rocket set to launch on Tuesday is intended for tourist excursions into suborbital space. The craft’s passengers include Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’ brother, Mark Bezos; Wally Funk, an 82-year-old pilot who graduated from a school for female astronauts in the 1960s; and Oliver Daemen, an 18-year-old Dutch student who was the company’s first paying client.
The firm has also been working on the New Glenn rocket, a 321-foot-tall vehicle that will utilize seven main engines to carry big payloads into space. Blue Origin said in February that it had achieved progress on many hardware components for the rocket and that it planned to launch New Glenn before the end of next year.
Blue Origin has made agreements to sell its technologies in space. United Launch Alliance, which launches satellites for the Pentagon and US intelligence agencies, is developing a new rocket engine. The engine, which will eventually replace Russian-made engines, is running late. Last week, NASA announced that Seattle-based Ultra Safe Nuclear Technologies will collaborate with Blue Origin, GE, and other companies to develop ideas for nuclear-propulsion systems that might propel spacecraft into deep space.
Blue Origin’s “aspirations are to become a business like SpaceX, like Boeing, like Lockheed Martin,” according to John Logsdon, the former head of George Washington University’s Space Policy Institute.
Micah Maidenberg and Doug Cameron may be reached at micah.maidenberg@wsj.com and doug.cameron@wsj.com, respectively.
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Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon and CEO of Blue Origin, is targeting bigger space goals. Reference: jeff bezos net worth.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is Jeff Bezos goal in space?
Jeff Bezos is the founder of Amazon.com and Blue Origin, a company that explores space through reusable rockets and spacecraft. His goal is to make humanity a multi-planetary species.
What is Jeff Bezos main goal for his company Blue Origin?
Jeff Bezos main goal for his company Blue Origin is to create a space tourism industry.
What did Bezos say about space?
I think space is going to be the next frontier for innovation and economic development.
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