Why Blue Origin’s Success Is So Important
Since Blue Origin’s start in 2000 and especially recently the company has had a lot of negative attention. This is due to many different reasons including lawsuits, transparency, slow progress, and more. However, it’s important to realize that whether you are a fan of the company or not, you should be hoping for their future success.
Blue Origin’s success is important to the overall future of the space industry. If the company does well and ends up reaching its goals it will help spark innovation, lower launch costs, increase access to space, and more. If Blue Origin does well they will likely compete with a lot of other private companies and benefit the industry significantly.
However, it’s also important that Blue Origin changes its current demeanor towards other companies and agencies. Things like lawsuits end up only hurting the industry and every company involved rather than helping it. With ambitious plans such as New Glenn, it’s possible Blue Origin ends up providing a lot of benefits to the space industry over time.
Blue Origin’s Negative History
Blue Origin has never been considered a fan favorite in the space industry. As I mentioned before this has to do with a lot of things however I am only going to focus on some of the bigger reasons. These main reasons include lawsuits, progress, and transparency. Blue Origin has had a history of lawsuits against other companies and agencies in the space industry. Most recently the company sued NASA for their lunar lander decision. NASA gave multiple companies the opportunity to win a large lunar lander contract and the agency ended up picking SpaceX. Blue Origin was not happy with this decision and filed a lawsuit against the agency. The private company was claiming NASA was prejudiced against Blue Origin and gave SpaceX an unfair advantage. Most of these lawsuits do nothing but hurt the industry as a whole rather than help it.
The next factor that doesn’t help Blue Origin’s case is their progress. The company was founded in 2000 by Jeff Bezos. However, in over 20 years the company is still yet to get a rocket into orbit. People often compare Blue Origin to SpaceX including the companies progress over time. This brings a lot of added criticism to the company. The final aspect I want to mention is transparency. What I mean by this is the access the public has to information on the current projects and rocket developments. Over time it has been very hard to keep up with Blue Origin. Unlike other companies like SpaceX, they keep everything they are working on away from the public eye. Other than a few promotional videos they publish it is very hard to find out their progress. This is not necessarily a bad thing but it does not help get people excited and hopeful for the future of Blue Origin. One of the big reasons SpaceX is so popular is because of the transparency of the company. Between SpaceX videos, Elon tweets, 24/7 cameras in Boca Chica, and more, almost everything SpaceX does is public.
Benefits Of Blue Origin’s Success
Innovation – One of the first benefits of Blue Origin’s success would be increased innovation. Looking at the current space industry innovation is everything. With new goals and aspirations comes new technology and ideas. Together these improvements can pave the way for a better future in the space industry. Currently, Blue Origin is working on New Glenn. This is a next-generation heavy-lift launch vehicle meant to be fully reusable. While it has some similarities to other rockets in the industry, there are also a lot of unique aspects to it. If Blue Origin has success with this rocket and future projects, it will help innovate the industry as a whole.
One of the first ways this happens is competition between different companies. If you are another private space company that competes against Blue Origin you need to have good prices and other specs. If Blue Origin innovates and creates a high-quality launch vehicle other companies will have to do the same. This competition will add more innovation and strongly benefit the space industry. Additionally, if Blue Origin were to develop a unique piece of technology that was very helpful, the rest of the industry might follow. The addition of more ideas and minds working towards a similar goal has a benefit not only on Blue Origin but the surrounding industry as well.
Lower Costs – Another benefit of Blue Origin’s success is lower costs. Currently, rockets big and small in the space industry are very expensive. This includes getting humans into space or cargo into orbit. If we want to increase our access to space then we need to lower the costs of spaceflight. If Blue Origin does well in the future then they would help lower costs. Similar to innovation this has to do with competition between companies. As great as private companies like SpaceX are, you don’t want a monopoly on the industry. If Blue Origin can do well over time and compete with other big companies then the costs are likely to go down significantly. This exact reason is a big part of what NASA is currently doing.
Recently NASA has been giving out a lot of different contracts to different private space companies. They also have ensured that they are working to spread the money to a lot of companies rather than one. The reason for this is because of what I mentioned before. They want competition between all the different private space companies. A perfect example of this could be the Commercial Crew Program. Here NASA gave both SpaceX and Boeing a substantial amount of money to create a safe and cost-effective human-rated spacecraft. The companies both worked on projects and now the Dragon spacecraft is consistently being used for human missions. If Blue Origin has success in the future it will help add competition and lower costs.
Access To Space – A final benefit of Blue Origin doing well is the increased access to space. No matter what future plans and goals are in space they require us to get into orbit first. This has to do with both the added innovation and lower costs. Whether we are looking at Mars, the Moon, space stations, or mining asteroids, more space access is beneficial. The more options and access we have above will help improve our understanding and confidence. This in return will help spark even more innovation and rapid improvements in the space industry. If Blue Origin can become a consistent launch provider in the future they will help increase our access to space significantly.
Blue Origin’s Future Plans
Blue Origin’s goals are different from other companies like SpaceX. Blue Origin has said its goal is to preserve Earth by going into space. Jeff Bezos has presented concepts of massive cities floating in space along with more realistic goals such as launching Amazon’s project Kuiper. Currently, the company is putting a lot of its focus on New Glenn. This rocket is meant to be fully reusable and not only put the company into orbit but do it in a cost-effective manner. New Glenn’s future success could have a direct effect on all of the benefits I mentioned before this. If the company focuses on its technology and future rather than lawsuits it will be a great addition to the space industry.
Conclusion
Blue Origin has never had a lot of public support over time. This has to do with multiple reasons including lawsuits, transparency, and lack of progress. However, their future success will provide a lot of benefits to different companies and agencies involved with space. This is mainly because of added innovation, lower costs, and increased access to space. Whether you are a fan of Blue Origin or not, if you want a brighter future in the space industry then you should hope for the companies success. We will have to wait and see what the company does in the future and the effect it has.
