Space Travel: Jeff Bezos’ Long-Term Investment

What’s the Latest Development?

Last week, the Amazon.com founder announced that a crack team of ‘undersea pros’ had located, at the bottom of the Atlantic, the huge engines that helped carry man to the moon aboard the Apollo 11 rocket. Bezos then declared his intention to recover the rockets from their watery grave, a mission that is the latest manifestation of his life-long fascination with space. “He created a private aerospace company called Blue Origin in 2000 with an aim to make space travel more affordable, and he’s spending millions to build a clock that’s supposed to last 10,000 years in the desert wilderness of West Texas.”

What’s the Big Idea?

Bezos sees not only a viable business model in space but also a better way to think about business, and about the planet. “My passion is for space, for sure, but I do think this can be made into a viable business,” Bezos said in a 2007 TV interview with PBS‘ Charlie Rose. “You have to be very long-term oriented.” Bezos believes that being misunderstood is inevitable if you are trying to change business as usual, and many are likely to look with ambivalence on a desert clock made to last 10,000 years. For Bezos, the clock is a symbol of the need for more sustainable business practices.

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