Billionaire CEOs are like betta fish. Put them in the identical tank they usually may get territorial (or write passive-aggressive tweets). A minimum of, that appears to be the case for Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos, who discover themselves in an ongoing feud over the race to area.
The 2, who’ve held rotating titles because the richest man on this planet (that at present goes to Musk), began off on shaky grounds from the very first day they met, in response to Walter Isaacson’s new biography of Elon Musk, titled merely Elon Musk. It appears as if the 2 high-powered people discover fault within the different’s comparable traits.
Within the early 2000s, Bezos was a single-digit billionaire and Amazon was nonetheless synonymous with promoting books. Musk was additional behind, but to make his first billion by investing in Tesla. The 2 formidable techies shared some commonalities; Isaacson wrote that each leaders centered on “constructing reusable rockets” and exploring areas as “a missionary quite than a mercenary,” that means they prioritized discovering extra assets for civilization quite than making a living from the endeavor. For Bezos, that took form in Blue Origin; for Musk, it was SpaceX.
Because the story goes, Musk reached out to Bezos in 2004 to offer him a tour of his SpaceX places of work. After their playdate, Bezos was reportedly stunned to get “a considerably curt e-mail from Musk expressing annoyance that Bezos had not reciprocated by inviting him to Seattle to see Blue Origin’s manufacturing unit,” in response to Isaacson. Bezos complied, inviting Musk and his then spouse Justine Musk to tour Blue Origin. In what absolutely made for an ungainly dinner afterward, Bezos after which spouse Mackenzie Scott, a now main philanthropic-donor, reportedly listened to Musk’s unsolicited recommendation about one in every of Bezos’ concepts.
“Dude, we tried that and that turned out to be actually dumb, so I’m telling you don’t do the factor we did,” Musk apparently mentioned “together with his normal depth,” as Isaacson wrote. It didn’t sit all that properly with Bezos, who recalled “feeling that Musk was a bit too certain of himself, provided that he had not but efficiently launched a rocket,” Isaacson added.
However should you ask Musk he’d doubtless say he was simply making an attempt to assist. “I truly did my finest to offer good recommendation, which he largely ignored,” Musk mentioned, in accordance Christian Davenport’s e book The House Barons, which explored the billionaire entrepreneurs making an attempt to resurrect area.
A 12 months later, Musk adopted up asking Bezos if Amazon may assessment Justine’s new e book—“an city horror thriller about demon-human hybrid,” as Isaacson described it. He supplied to jot down a private assessment as a substitute since that’s not what Amazon does, solely to obtain a “brusque reply” from Musk. However the Amazon CEO nonetheless reportedly wrote the assessment.
Relations stay tense
As Bezos and Musk each turned richer (and as wealth inequality spiked) and their desires of area grew extra fanciful and funded, the rivalry between the 2 ballooned. Between patent disputes and thinly-pointed tweets, they’ve spent the higher a part of the last decade needling the opposite whereas at occasions pausing to offer the opposite reward for innovation.
In 2013, the 2 beefed over who may lease a NASA launchpad. SpaceX ultimately received out. Musk has reacted and re-posted stale memes at Bezos’ expense, and Bezos too has engaged in his personal enjoyable, congratulating SpaceX for touchdown a craft by saying “Welcome to the membership!” In 2021, NASA selected SpaceX as a substitute of Blue Origin to assist develop the subsequent moon touchdown tasks. However Bezos didn’t go down simply, preventing the choice solely to be overruled by a choose. Their ongoing feud has even led to a lawsuit.
Their pursuits truly run tandem to one another in a approach that doesn’t have to engender competitors, however would quite make for a superb partnership, affiliate professor at College of East Anglia Ben Little writes for The Dialog. “It’s straightforward to see that, at a fundamental degree, Musk’s and Bezos’s acknowledged plans for area domination are complementary, quite than aggressive,” Little states, including that whereas Bezos thinks Musk’s thought of colonizing Mars is just not grounded, Musk believes Bezos’ thought of constructing a “big orbiting area station” infrastructure received’t be developed shortly sufficient.
Musk has implied his needling remarks over time are purported to inspire Bezos. “In some methods, I’m making an attempt to goad him into spending extra time at Blue Origin so that they make extra progress,” Musk as soon as instructed the Monetary Occasions.
Whether or not or not the feud is legit or one-sided is uncertain, except you’re in a billionaire’s thoughts. However one factor that’s for certain: Their first assembly was not (inter)stellar.
