By Andy Pasztor
The space-transportation company run by Amazon.com Inc. founder
Jeff Bezos on Tuesday announced European satellite operator
Eutelsat SA is its first commercial launch customer, highlighting
progress in developing a world-class rocket that could compete with
existing boosters within a few years.
With a blastoff date slated for 2021, the agreement catapults
Blue Origin LLC, founded in 2000 by the Amazon chief and
billionaire entrepreneur, into a position to potentially vie for
launch business from other global satellite firms. Work on the
massive rocket that is intended to boost the satellite into orbit
wasn't revealed by Blue Origin until late last year.
Tuesday's joint announcement, made at an international trade
show in Washington, represents Blue Origin's emergence as a force
in the commercial satellite world. From the outset, the rocket --
called New Glenn -- was intended to be reusable, and Mr. Bezos said
during his presentation that it is being designed to fly as many as
100 times.
Underscoring Blue Origin's growth, Mr. Bezos said the company,
based in a Seattle suburb, now has more than 1,000 employees. The
company expects a two-stage version of the New Glenn rocket to
blast a payload of up to 13 tons into low-Earth orbit.
Once a major satellite company develops enough trust in a newly
designed rocket to commit to a maiden launch -- even if at a
sharply reduced price -- launch contracts with other operators
typically follow.
Neither Mr. Bezos nor Eutelsat disclosed the price of the
anticipated launch, but traditionally such introductory missions
have involved as much as a 70% cut from the projected full
price.
For Blue Origin, which hasn't yet conducted a full-fledged test
flight of its big booster, the contract with Eutelsat adds to the
credibility of the space company's team.
Plans for heavy-lift boosters previously unveiled by Mr. Bezos,
including one roughly half as powerful as the iconic Saturn V
rockets that lifted Apollo astronauts to the moon, ultimately could
emerge as rivals to powerful rockets already under development by
fellow billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk's Space Exploration
Technologies Corp., or SpaceX.
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is working on
its own version of a deep-space booster and capsule.
The two-stage version of the New Glenn rocket, named after the
late U.S. astronaut and senator John Glenn, previously was
described by Blue Origin as 270 feet tall, and able to generate
nearly 3.9 million pounds of thrust from seven main engines. A
larger, three-stage version would be more than 310 feet tall.
With a few exceptions, Mr. Bezos has opted to run Blue Origin
since its founding at the beginning of the last decade behind a
strict veil of secrecy -- and without seeking substantial federal
contracts or development funding. As expected, however, Tuesday's
announcement adds transparency.
Last fall, Mr. Bezos rocked the international aerospace
community by disclosing some particulars of the New Glenn rocket.
If it begins commercial flights within four years as intended, the
booster also would become a competitor for Arianespace, Europe's
premier launch provider, and United Launch Alliance, a joint
venture between Boeing Co. and Lockheed Martin Corp.
Over the years, Mr. Bezos has stressed the importance of
creating reusable technology capable of slashing transportation
costs by operating much more frequently than today's rockets. He
also has talked about his long-term vision of "millions of people
living and working in space."
The Eutelsat announcement came a day after Mr. Bezos released
the first photographs of a fully assembled BE-4 engine, which will
power New Glenn into orbit.
In conjunction with his speech at the satellite conference, Mr.
Bezos continued his pattern of focusing on long-term goals of space
exploration and settlement. In a message posted on Twitter, the
self-described "space geek" pointedly said he and his company
"can't wait to take you to space."
Mr. Bezos told conference attendees that to make space
transportation less expensive, the eventual goal ought to be to
make rocket launches comparable to commercial aircraft operations.
SpaceX's Mr. Musk and other commercial-space champions have echoed
the same sentiments over the years.
New Glenn piggybacks on development of Blue Origin's simpler,
suborbital New Shepard launch system, a single-stage rocket and
capsule designed to fly fare-paying tourists some 60 miles above
the planet. Test flights with crew members aboard are expected to
begin sometime this year, with commercial operations starting
perhaps a year later.
Basking in the glow of his new role as a satellite launch
provider, Mr. Bezos told the audience, "we couldn't hope for a
better first partner."
Based in Paris, Eutelsat has more than three dozen satellites
circling the Earth and provides services that include video
broadcasting, news gathering and broadband connections. Started as
an international satellite organization in the 1970s, it became a
private company in 2001.
Previously, Mr., Bezos signaled his engineers and scientists
also were actively working on a significantly larger rocket
designed for interplanetary travel. He reiterated on Tuesday that
he became enthralled with space at the age of five, watching the
first human landing on the Moon, and has been fascinated with it
since that experience. "You don't choose your passions" he told the
conference, according to news reports.
But on Tuesday, the thrust of his presentation as well as the
focus of the audience appeared to be on New Glenn -- and its
previously secret features. The rocket, for instance, is designed
to be able to land on a floating platform even in windy conditions,
as a result of fins that help control aerodynamic forces. And it
has six deployable legs to ensure a soft touchdown.
Write to Andy Pasztor at andy.pasztor@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
March 07, 2017 14:23 ET (19:23 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2017 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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