VAN HORN, Texas — Jeff Bezos‘ space company Blue Origin has sold nearly $100 million worth in tickets for future passenger flights, the billionaire founder announced on Tuesday.
“The demand [for people to fly on trips to the edge of space] is very, very high,” Bezos said at Blue Origin’s presentation after its first crewed flight.
The company has not disclosed how much it prices seats on its New Shepard rocket. The only indication of Blue Origin’s pricing structure is a public auction the company held for a seat on its first flight with Bezos, which went for $28 million. That’s multiple times the $200,000 to $500,000 range that Blue Origin’s suborbital space tourism competitor Virgin Galactic has sold seats on its future flights.
Bezos said Blue Origin is “going to fly human missions twice more this year” but said “I’m not sure yet” how many crewed New Shepard launches the company will attempt in 2022.
“We’ll figure that out,” Bezos said, adding that Blue Origin wants to fly spaceflights at a “very high” rate in the future.
Blue Origin currently has two New Shepard rocket boosters at its facility in Texas, with one for research cargo flights and the other for flying passengers.
“We really do want to practice with this vehicle, so we’re going to have to build more boosters … to fly more frequently,” Bezos said.
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