Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk have an extended historical past of trolling one another, notably concerning the house enterprise. In line with an investor lawsuit filed a number of months in the past, the billionaire rivalry performed a task in Amazon not selecting Musk’s SpaceX to launch satellites for its Challenge Kuiper, which is able to compete towards the Starlink broadband web service offered by SpaceX.
The lawsuit claimed that Amazon management “excluded the most obvious and affordable launch provider, SpaceX, from its procurement process because of Bezos’ personal rivalry with Musk,” thereby breaching “basic fiduciary responsibilities.” Amazon mentioned the lawsuit’s claims have been “completely without merit.”
Yesterday, Amazon introduced that it’s signed a contract with SpaceX for 3 launches of Challenge Kuiper satellites on SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket. It acknowledged: “Project Kuiper satellites were designed from the start to accommodate multiple launch providers and vehicles, allowing us to reduce schedule risk and move faster in our mission to connect unserved and underserved communities around the world.”
In April final yr, Amazon mentioned it had secured as much as 83 launches for greater than 3,000 satellites from three industrial house firms: Arianespace, Blue Origin, and United Launch Alliance (ULA). Blue Origin, in fact, was based by Bezos, who at present serves Amazon’s govt chairman, having resigned as CEO in 2021.
In October, Amazon launched its first two satellites for Challenge Kuiper aboard an UAL Atlas V rocket, which took off from Florida. The corporate’s purpose is to place greater than 3,300 satellites into low Earth orbit. Amazon must launch half of its Kuiper constellation by 2026 as a way to be compliant with its license from the Federal Communications Fee.
The satellites have been the one payload on the Atlas V but represented only a fraction of its payload capability. “It’s like using a tractor-trailer to transport a couple of suitcases,” Brian Weeden, an govt at Safe World Basis, an area sustainability nonprofit, advised Bloomberg.
The SpaceX launches carrying Challenge Kuiper payload are focused to carry off starting in mid-2025, mentioned Amazon, which expects to have sufficient satellites deployed within the second half of subsequent yr to start early buyer pilots.
Starlink has an enormous head begin, nevertheless, and the service is anticipated to signify the vast majority of SpaceX’s income in some unspecified time in the future subsequent yr, based on Bloomberg. Musk has mentioned Starlink will finally do a spin-off IPO, although not till predictions about its money stream might be made “reasonably well.”
Finally Starlink and Challenge Kuiper will probably be competing for patrons in distant or in any other case cut-off locations across the globe. The rivalry will assist slim the digital divide, with billions of individuals on the planet nonetheless missing web entry.
However don’t count on Musk and Bezos to cease ribbing one another, as Musk did in a November 2021 tweet referencing Decide Dredd, a dystopian sci-fi movie. It adopted Blue Origin dropping a authorized struggle over NASA awarding a multibillion-dollar moon lander contract to SpaceX. “You have been judged,” learn the put up.