On Wednesday, May 5th, it was reported that Blue Origin, Jeff Bezos’s rocket company, will start selling tickets to space tourists for a sightseeing trip on its New Shepard spacecraft. The wealthy are especially welcomed on board the rocket. Bezos himself hints at that in a promo video. Blue Origin keeps the cost of tickets a secret. According to the company’s representatives, details will be given to potential clients after leaving their contact information (a full name and an email) on Blue Origin’s official website. The promo video published on the website features Jeff Bezos heading to the landing site of New Shepard after a test flight. At the end, the video says that the time has come. To find out the price of one seat on that first mission, users should be registered on the website. The company announced that it can take six passengers to space at once. The previous trials showed that the capsule can go above 100km. The release of the promo video triggered a 3% plunge in Virgin Galactic Holdings shares. It is suggested that the drop came as a result of possible competition between Bezos’s Blue Origin and the company of British entrepreneur Richard Branson. Analysts assume that the race for dominance in the niche segment of space suborbital tourism will pick up steam shortly.
