*In 2018, Bezos announced he would start investing a cool $1 billion from sales of his personal shares of Amazon stock into the Blue Origin space program every year. By 2014, Bezos had reportedly invested over $500 million of his own funds into the company * and in late 2015, the first New Shepard rocket successfully launched into space and then successfully returned to earth, touching down vertically in a controlled descent. But Corvettes are for mere mortals, like President Joe Biden.Īfter all, Bezos isn’t going to Disneyland, he’s going to space.Īnd, if the famously private Jeff Bezos was devastated by being beaten by Richard Branson, he didn’t show it when a video of unbridled joy was taken of him aboard the successful Jflight of Blue Origin’s New Shepard spacecraft – named after early space pioneer Alan Shepard (and not after the shepard’s Staff of Life, as some critics have dubbed it due to its suggestive shape).īezos formed Blue Origin on paper back in 2000, but the real activity began a few years later as the company acquired land in south Texas for a spaceport. Jeff Bezos, Amazon Founder and Financial Backer of Blue Originįresh off a divorce and recently retired from running the $386 billion company he founded – Amazon – one couldn’t help feeling a more middle-class version Bezos would be buying a new Corvette to fend off a looming middle-age crisis. It features a heavy-duty, double laminated work surface and large cutout to integrate with an industrial sewing machine to sew parachutes or other applicable materials. Formaspace manufactured this large custom workbench for a flight school. So, on July 11, 2021, Virgin Galactic successfully launched their VSS Unity spacecraft from the aircraft-based launcher VMS Eve it carried Branson, three employees, and two pilots to the very edge of space (defined as 50 miles above sea level), where they experienced three precious minutes of weightlessness before returning safely to earth – and probably not a little bit of satisfaction at beating rival Bezos into space by a scant 19 days. Upon hearing that his rival Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon, and financial backer of Branson’s space flight competitor Blue Origin, planned to launch himself into space on July 20, 2021, Branson’s team sped up their launch plans several weeks to beat Bezos to the punch. However, delays and a disastrous inflight breakup of the VSS Enterprise in 2014 set the project back many years as the revised spacecraft designs were developed and tested. But, as it turns out, both the financial investment and the projects were real, and it was hoped the first space flight would take place by 2010. In 2004, Branson announced a new venture, Virgin Galactic, which would take tourists into space.Īt the time, many discounted this as nothing more than one of Branson’s many audacious publicity stunts. Richard Branson, Founder Virgin Records and later Virgin GalacticĪfter establishing himself as a media mogul built on the success of his Virgin Records label, Richard Branson’s next act was to expand his brand into air travel by launching Virgin Atlantic and Virgin Australia airlines.

Let’s take a closer look at today’s billionaire space explorers. It also reminds us of the fierce competition in 1911 to be the first explorer to reach the South Pole, a race in which Norway’s Roald Amundsen ultimately prevailed, and Britain’s Robert Falcon Scott tragically perished. In either case, one thing is certain: private space travel is a rich man’s game, especially considering that only a few of the wealthiest countries in the world have the financial means to mount a successful trip to the edge of space. Or are you one of the cynics who dismiss it as more “bread and circuses” to entertain the masses?

What is your take on billionaires Richard Branson and Jeff Bezos rocketing up into space?ĭo you see it as a welcome distraction from the world’s woes of fire, flood, and pandemic?

Mars Horizon for apple instal