The first attempt by Jeff Bezos’s private space company, Blue Origin, to launch a rocket into orbit will be a seminal moment for the space business. After receiving the go-ahead from US regulators last week, the Amazon founder finally looks close to matching Elon Musk in providing humanity with a way to escape the bounds of Earth — a once unthinkable achievement for a single, wealthy private individual.
Despite predating Musk’s SpaceX by two years, Blue Origin has suffered years of delays. A successful launch for its orbital rocket, called New Glenn, would finally carry it beyond its current limited business of ferrying passengers to the edge of space, pitting the world’s two richest men against each other in an escalation of the private space race.