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back to article Look out, SpaceX! Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin boffins tapped for US rocket launches

Blue Origin, the commercial space company formed by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, has inked a deal with the United Launch Alliance (ULA) to jointly develop a new, US-built rocket engine for future space missions. “This agreement ensures ULA will remain the most cost-efficient, innovative and reliable company launching the nation’ …

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  1. stuartnz

    It must be Thursday

    I never could get the hang of Thursday's headlines. I really do love El Reg's deliberately tabloidesque headlines, they often provide a great deal of amusement. This one certainly had plenty of the hyped angst such headlines love, leading off with that "Look out!" then casually mentioning in the very last paragraph that said threat is five years away.

    I'm sure that Musk's minions are hard at work already making sure they're ready to mount a viable challenge to Blue Origin's 2019 product line. Seeing how far Space X has come in the last five years makes me think they'll be more than up to the task of providing a competitive alternative in another five.

    4 0 Reply
  2. Ben Holmes
    Mushroom

    You jest, surely...

    "ULA will remain the most cost-efficient, innovative and reliable"

    Didn't need to read the rest of the article - the punchline was in the second paragraph.

    6 0 Reply
  3. VeganVegan
    Flame

    This is great news

    ULA (read Lockheed and Boeing) has been at the government pig trough long enough.

    Hopefully, with the injection of both Musk and Bezos into the mix, there will be competition going forward.

    We can now realistically dream of $100/kg space access!

    (any way of turning that icon upside down?)

    3 1 Reply
    1. Tom 13
      Reply Icon

      Re: This is great news

      Sorry, I don't see how you get more competition out of "Blue Origin Joins Existing Rocket Cartel". Looks to me like the only competition now is Space X when it could have been Space X and Blue Origin vs the Rocket Cartel.

      4 0 Reply
  4. Chris G

    Threat

    ULA putting money into an outside party shows just how threatened by Space X they must feel. They obviously have little on the cards as a follow up to the rebuilt and modernised '60s Atlas. They are desperate to keep the upstart out of their trough; still they can afford it with the lion's share of each divvy up from NASA going to them so I guess they are trying to buy the success they seem unable to deliver.

    6 0 Reply
  5. Dave Harvey

    ULA still seem to be doing well on government hand-outs

    They get nearly twice as much as SpaceX, for essentially the same project (development + 6 flights of a 7 man capsule).

    Still, I suppose the US government needs to find SOME means to subsidise Boeing to keep Airbus under control, with some degree of plausible deniability with respect to WTO "dumping" regulations!

    6 1 Reply
    1. phuzz Silver badge
      Reply Icon
      Meh

      Re: ULA still seem to be doing well on government hand-outs

      Both companies got the money they asked for, ie SpaceX put in a bid that was about half of Boeing's for the same number of flights.

      You might think that costing half the price would make SpaceX the front runner, but US politics doesn't seem to work like that.

      0 0 Reply
      1. Obvious simpleton
        Reply Icon

        Re: ULA still seem to be doing well on government hand-outs

        I would think that it is when this contract comes up for renegotiation that either the competition will drop their trousers or the contract will favor Spacex. All bets off if there are any expensive fireworks displays.

        Once proven at this 7 seater level I think we can reliably see the cost competition get either very tight or back channel deals keeping the bids high. I hope for the former!

        Good luck spacex!

        0 0 Reply
  6. et tu, brute?
    WTF?

    Recent?

    Since the space shuttle's retirement, recent missions to the ISS have relied on Russian Soyuz spacecraft

    Talk about a totally unnecessary word in that sentence... It's been like that for 3 years already!

    1 0 Reply
  7. Kharkov
    Facepalm

    Probably too little, too late from ULA...

    A new engine for a (probably) updated, (probably) cheaper-to-build Atlas derivative - the Atlas V Mk II or Atlas 6 (and will there be an Atlas 6 Plus)?

    Cool but...

    Five years before the engines are ready, probably a bit longer than that for the Atlas V successor to arrive, but unless it'll have things like deep throttling, long lifespan & reusability, then it'll (probably) be competing against an established 1st-stage-reusable Falcon 9 v1.1 with, lest we forget, 2nd stage reusability (probably) coming down the pipe.

    So new rocket with no previous track record competing against an established rocket that's already in a dominant position...

    ULA will be the new SpaceX...

    Without reusability and at a higher selling price...

    Good luck with that.

    NOTE: Nobody would be happier than me if ULA could actually compete on things like price, payload & other stuff against SpaceX. I just don't think they'll do it. In my opinion, the new rocket will be another expensive, one-time-usage beast and the market will have moved on by the time it arrives.

    1 0 Reply
    1. Tom 13
      Reply Icon

      Re: ULA will be the new SpaceX...

      I'd like to think it would work that way.

      But the truth is that I expect they'll re-write the rules so that ULA remains ULA and SpaceX will always have the deck stacked against them.

      On the bright side, if SpaceX keeps winning even with the deck stacked against them, it means we're getting a really good rocket from SpaceX.

      1 0 Reply
  8. Alister

    How curious - in the abstract - that we will shortly be in the position where the only two companies making heavy lift rocket engines in the USA are owned / run by Internet entrepreneurs, and are not part of the "traditional" Aerospace hegemony.

    2 0 Reply

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