There is a fierce race in the space industry involving Jeff Bezos, the world's richest man who owns Blue Origin, and Elon Musk, the richest human runner-up who owns SpaceX. You could say, their race has reached the affairs of the Moon.
As reported, Jeff Bezos really did not accept NASA winning SpaceX to make a landing system on the surface of the Moon or Human Landing System (HLS). To the extent that Blue Origin sued NASA legally to court because of this issue.
The fierce competition between Bezos and Musk indicates that the space industry will be very interesting in its development. "Consumers for services (to the Moon) are only NASA, but there are two billionaires interested. This actually benefits NASA," said Lori Garve, a former NASA official.
Blue Origin is suing NASA for being anti-competitive by choosing SpaceX. "Without competition, NASA's short-term and long-term ambitions will be delayed, will cost more and have no national interest," Bezos said.
So far, experts say there are no problems with NASA's contract with SpaceX. In addition to being cheaper, SpaceX's technology is considered to have been tested. But Bezos doesn't seem to be giving up.
Bezos and Musk have been in fierce competition for a long time. They used to get along quite well. Not long ago, a viral photo on Twitter showed the two figures eating together in 2004. Posted by Twitter user Trung Phan, Musk and Bezos were seen smiling at the camera and eating together at one table.
"In 2004, Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos ate together to discuss outer space. This was one of their few personal interactions," Phan wrote in the caption of the tweet.
The meeting in 2004 was believed to be the beginning of their fierce competition in the space business. Since then they have not gotten along and criticized each other. "I actually did my best to give him good advice, but mostly he just ignored it," said Elon Musk once.
