Eutelsat to Be Inaugural Customer for Blue Origin's Commercial Launches

Eutelsat will be Blue Origin's first commercial launch customer, with the inaugural launch likely in 2021, Blue Origin founder Jeff Bezos and Eutelsat CEO Rodolphe Belmer announced Tuesday at Satellite 2017. Bezos said Blue Origin's aim is to significantly reduce launch costs through both operational reusability and the expertise the company gains by multiple flights of its New Shepard suborbital space tourism launches. He said Blue Origin is focusing on reclaiming its launch boosters through vertical landings, instead of parachutes, because that new approach is particularly scalable to larger booster rockets. And Bezos said by lowering launch costs, satellites “will be less precious; you will be able to take more technology risks.” The result “will be a much larger industry," he said.