[nscalf]

The default state of space is failure. It's incredibly expensive, extremely error prone, and failure can have catastrophic results. There's a reason SpaceX was laughed out of room for years. Hell, the most basic problem is described as tyranny.

Regardless of how rich Bezos is, can he bring the right type of talent together and get that talent to make no errors? How many hundreds of millions to billions of dollars is he willing to throw away with nothing to show for it? It's not just can it be done, it's can it be done in this competitive environment before SpaceX pulls so far ahead that there isn't any reason to compete? Add onto it that most of the top talent wants to be, and is, at SpaceX.

[DennisP]

Also I think BO is doing things the hard way. SpaceX started with small expendable rockets carrying cargo. That kept the stakes reasonably low, and let them rapidly iterate and learn from experience. BO's first orbital rocket is supposed to be a heavy-lift reusable.