Tag: Jeff Bezos

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Space billionaires honored as ‘Legends of Aviation’

Jeff Bezos and Paul Allen
Two Seattle billionaires, Jeff Bezos (left) and the late Paul Allen (right), will be honored for their contributions to aviation and space next week at a Beverly Hills awards ceremony. (GeekWire Photos)

Amazon billionaire Jeff Bezos has racked up another round of recognition for his role on the space frontier: Next week he’ll be inducted into the Living Legends of Aviation, alongside aerospace executives, pioneering skydiver Joe Kittinger and musician Kenny G.

Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, who passed away in October, will receive a posthumous tribute as a “Flown West Legend” during the Living Legends of Aviation Awards ceremony, scheduled for Jan. 18 at the Beverly Hilton Hotel in Beverly Hills, Calif.

The star-studded event, produced as a fundraiser for the Kiddie Hawk Air Academy, honors those who have made significant contributions to aviation. Bezos is among this year’s inductees by virtue of his role in founding the Blue Origin space venture and supporting it to the tune of $1 billion a year.

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10,000 Year Clock is gearing up for visitors

10,000 Year Clock
Workers install the 10,000 Year Clock inside an underground chamber in Texas. (Long Now Foundation)techno

With $42 million in funding from Amazon billionaire Jeff Bezos, the Long Now Foundation can afford to take the long view about a massive clock designed to run for 10,000 years — but it’s also open to hosting visitors in the nearer term.

The leader of the team behind the 10,000 Year Clock, which is currently being built inside a mountain in West Texas, talked about getting the place ready for guests in an interview published on Friday by The Hustle.

“We have a year or so more of installation work, and a year of commissioning,” Alexander Rose, executive director of the Long Now Foundation, was quoted as saying. “Then we’ll start to have people up to the clock.”

Don’t expect it to be a theme-park experience, however.

“The area is very remote high desert — one of the smallest per-capita areas in the lower 48 states,” The Hustle quoted Rose as saying. “People will have to hike up 2K feet to see it. Hopefully, it’ll be an experience that gives them some time to think about it all.”

Although Rose’s comments made it sound as if tours could begin in as little as two years, a spokesman for the Long Now Foundation told GeekWire that no completion date has been set.

“We don’t know when the clock will be completed,” Long Now’s Andrew Warner said in an email. “We have given hundreds of interviews and never given a completion estimate — part of the whole point of the project is to not limit ourselves to a completion date.”

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How Blue Origin’s HQs blazed a trail for Amazon

Jeff Bezos and New Glenn
Jeff Bezos shows off the concept for the New Glenn orbital rocket during a Florida news conference in 2015. (Blue Origin Photo)

The process that Amazon went through to choose New York, Northern Virginia and Nashville as key sites for expansion isn’t the first HQ2 exercise for CEO Jeff Bezos: You could argue that the pattern was set when Bezos’ Blue Origin space venture decided where it’d manufacture and launch its New Glenn rocket.

Blue Origin’s selection process produced far less hype than the yearlong contest that Amazon conducted, and far fewer jobs were at stake. But like the HQ2/3/4 arrangement announced today, the exercise ended up producing multiple winners — as well as disappointed suitors.

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Jeff Bezos unveils Amazon’s flying tribute to vets

Valor unveiled
Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, right, pulls the wraps off Prime Air’s newest 767 freighter, christened Valor in honor of veterans. He is joined by Ardine Williams, left, VP of Worldwide People Operations, and Sarah Rhoads, director of Amazon Air. (Amazon Photo / Dan Krauss)

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos is big on veterans, and in honor of Veterans Day, he presided over the vet-friendly christening of Valor, Amazon Air’s 40th Boeing 767 freighter.

In a tweet, Bezos said the name pays tribute to “the thousands of Amazonian veterans and military spouses delivering for our customers every day.”

A cheering crowd, including more than 100 Amazon veterans and military spouses, was on hand for today’s ceremony at Long Beach Airport in California. After an appropriate drum roll, Bezos pulled down a banner that was slung over the plane’s nose, revealing the plane’s name.

“Introducing Valor!” Bezos said. Amazon said the name was chosen by Warriors@Amazon, an employee affinity group for veterans.

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Elon Musk talks up Space Force and Jeff Bezos

Elon Musk
Elon Musk speaks at a space conference in 2016. (SpaceX Photo)

Elon Musk, the billionaire CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, is really psyched about the electric pickup truck he’s got on the drawing board — and he’s also cool with the Space Force and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin space effort.

Those are just a few of the talking points that emerged when he sat down for an 80-minute Q&A on Halloween, after months of cajoling from Recode alpha-geek Kara Swisher.

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High-flying management tips from Jeff Bezos

Jeff Bezos
Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos speaks at the 2018 Air, Space and Cyber Conference. (DVIDS / DOD)

When Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos spoke today at the Air Force Association’s 2018 Air, Space and Cyber Conference, his head wasn’t just up in the clouds.

To be sure, he devoted a lot of attention to his Blue Origin space venture and what it could offer for U.S. space dominance. But Bezos also talked about two-way vs. one-way doors in decision making; experimentation vs. operational excellence, and other strategies from Amazon’s management playbook. There were even references to Amazon’s HQ2 search, and the value of putting square pegs in round holes.

Check out the transcript of Bezos’ 50-minute talk with retired Gen. Larry Spencer at the conference in National Harbor, Md.

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Jeff Bezos sells Air Force on rockets and the cloud

Jeff Bezos and Larry Spencer
Jeff Bezos, the billionaire founder of Amazon and Blue Origin, chats with retired Air Force Gen. Larry Spencer at the Air Force Association’s annual conference at National Harbor, Md.

Billionaire Jeff Bezos made a subtle sales pitch for Amazon Web Services as well as the New Glenn rockets being built by his Blue Origin space venture today during a wide-ranging fireside chat at the Air Force Association’s annual conference.

But he stayed mum when it came to the first question asked by his partner on stage, retired Air Force Gen. Larry Spencer: Where will Amazon put its second headquarters, better known as HQ2?

“We’ll make a decision before the end of the year,” Bezos said good-naturedly at the Air, Space and Cyber Conference at National Harbor, Md. “That’s all I can say on that topic. We’re excited to make that decision.”

The world’s richest person was far more voluble about his philosophy on management, and how that applies to the things that the Air Force cares about. Speaking to an audience flush with military uniforms, Bezos said it’s critical for the United States to maintain its dominance in the space domain.

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Analyst sees Jeff Bezos as ’emerging force’ in space

Amazon's Jeff Bezos
Amazon billionaire Jeff Bezos takes questions in front of Blue Origin’s mock-up for the New Shepard spaceship’s crew capsule. (GeekWire Photo / Kevin Lisota)

The news of the day is all about Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’ philanthropic efforts, but on the business side of things, an influential financial analyst argues that the world’s richest man is an “emerging force” with the financial muscle to advance the global space industry — and Amazon as well.

In a note to investors, Morgan Stanley analyst Adam Jonas and his colleagues say Bezos’ Blue Origin venture, as well as Amazon, should be included along with Elon Musk’s SpaceX and more than 100 other firms as key participants in a commercial space race.

Jonas writes that investors may want to pay far more attention to Bezos’ space efforts, which the billionaire has said is the “most important work that I’m doing.”

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Artist uses spaceship to launch double entendre

Work magazine spread
A photo spread from the latest issue of Work magazine had a little fun with Amazon billionaire Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin rocket venture. (Work / CIPD / Blue Origin Photo via @christhebarker on Twitter)

It’s hard to top the risque rocket scene in “Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me,” but Blue Origin’s New Shepard rocket has also spawned its share of comparisons to the male anatomy.

The latest double entendre paying tribute to Amazon billionaire Jeff Bezos’ space venture appears in Work magazine, a controlled-circulation quarterly published by the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development in Britain.

Graphic designer Chris Barker, who was also behind the viral “Lonely Hearts” roundup of 2016’s celebrity deaths, deemed it a point of pride that he was able to get his visual joke into print. “Pleased my headline/image combo got through,” he tweeted.

The layout shows Blue Origin’s New Shepard on one page, in all its phallic glory, opposite a bold headline reading, “What Exactly Is Jeff Bezos Trying to Prove?”

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New Shepard hits new heights in test spaceflight

Blue Origin New Shepard spaceship
Blue Origin’s New Shepard spaceship blasts off for an escape system test. (Blue Origin via YouTube)

As Amazon billionaire Jeff Bezos watched, his Blue Origin space venture sent its reusable New Shepard spaceship to its highest-ever altitude today during a successful test of a rocket motor that’s meant to be used only in emergencies.

The climax of the uncrewed test flight came shortly after New Shepard’s capsule separated from its booster and switched on its 70,000-pound-thrust escape rocket motor.

As planned, the high-altitude firing pushed the capsule past the boundary of outer space, to an unofficial maximum altitude of 389,846 feet, or 119 kilometers. Maximum ascent velocity was listed at 2,236 mph.

Then both the booster and the capsule made picture-perfect landings back at Blue Origin’s West Texas test site, within sight of the launch pad. The entire mission lasted 11 minutes and 17 seconds.

“Anything could have happened today, and this is the best possible outcome,” launch commentator Ariane Cornell said.

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