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Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin rocket company just landed a major contract.
His company’s BE-4 engines will power United Launch Alliance’s Vulcan Centaur, a new suite of rockets designed to better compete on price with Elon Musk’s SpaceX. Its initial launch is expected in 2020.
The contract with ULA marks a high-profile vote of confidence in Bezos’ space startup.
Blue Origin said: “We are pleased that United Launch Alliance has selected our BE-4 engine. United Launch Alliance is the premier launch service provider for national security missions, and we are excited to be part of their team and this mission.” Chief Executive Officer Officer Bob Smith said in a statement announcing the award Thursday.
ULA, a business jointly owned by long-term government contractors boeing company (Bachelor) and Lockheed Martin (LMT)competing with SpaceX to launch sensitive national security satellites for the U.S. government.
But the company must rely on Russian-made RD-180 engines to put its workhorse Atlas V rocket into orbit. This caused some political trouble for ULA.
Bezos has said he is financing Blue Origin by selling his stake worth about $1 billion. Amazon (Amazon) Competition for contracts every year: Aerospace companies rocket dyne aerojet (AJRD)It has a legendary history of providing propulsion technology for NASA and existing ULA rockets, and has also participated in the competition for the ULA engine contract.
“ULA selected the best system to build the Vulcan Centaur,” ULA CEO Tory Bruno said in a statement Thursday.
Blues win big
Blue Origin’s win is no surprise. The BE-4 is further developed than a similar Aerojet engine (called the AR1) and is expected to be cheaper to manufacture.
Bruno has previously stated that he prefers Blue’s BE-4 to Aerojet’s AR1.
Bill Ostroff, a space analyst at Forecast International, said the announcement “remains very important.” “The fact that (Blue Origin) was able to beat an established, legendary company like Aerojet … is a major win for a startup.”
Bezos founded Blue Origin in 2000. The company has only conducted test flights of its suborbital New Shepard rocket, which it plans to use to carry passengers on short, scenic trips.
The company began developing the BE-4 in 2011, a large rocket engine intended for use in more powerful launch vehicles. The BE-4 completed its first test launch last year.
Blue Origin’s contract win means the company will move forward with plans to open a massive manufacturing facility in Huntsville, Alabama. The company said last July that if the deal with ULA could be completed, it would build a 200,000-square-foot factory that would create up to 400 new manufacturing jobs.
It also puts Blue Origin in the enviable position of producing BE-4 engines for two different rockets that will eventually compete with each other for launch contracts.
In addition to powering ULA’s Vulcan, the BE-4 will also power Blue Origin’s own heavy-lift launch vehicle called New Glenn.
The two rockets will also compete with SpaceX and Northrop Grumman Corporation (National Olympic Committee) Obtain lucrative military launch contracts.
“A major failure”
Ostrov said Blue Origin’s victory marked a “significant defeat” for Aerojet because it effectively excluded the company from developing main engines for any heavy-lift launch vehicle.
SpaceX builds its own engines for its Falcon rocket, and Northrop Grumman is expected to build the same engines for its OmegA rocket.
Still, Aerojet has a substantial business building small engines, including those that power the Vulcan upper stage. It also produces engines for NASA’s Space Launch System.
Aerojet’s AR1 can still be used to power medium-sized launch vehicles, Steve Warren, Aerojet’s vice president of communications, told CNN on Thursday.
“This could easily become the workhorse engine of the United States,” he said.
Ostrov was skeptical. “It’s hard to find a place for it in the market,” he said. “There’s not a lot of activity in the mid-size launch market.”
CNN Business (New York) First published September 27, 2018: 7:03pm ET