Jeff Bezos being suid for hating Elon Musk

[thewayne]

*snicker*

This is absolutely true, but obviously a little more complicated than that. You need to remember that Bezos, like Musk, owns a rocket company, Blue Origin. Theoretically it competes with SpaceX, Musk's rocket company, but let's face it, BO doesn't do much.

Amazon is theoretically going to launch a satellite constellation called Project Kuiper, which is a satellite internet thingie much like what Musk is operating. BO doesn't have the lift capacity right now that actually works, so they're going to another rocket company to get their satellites into space.

And they didn't consider SpaceX - which has the lift and availability right now, and is pretty darn reliable. Bezos and Amazon are being sued by a pension fund, and I'll let the article speak for itself, because the words just make my heart glow when billionaires go after each other: "Shareholders of a pension fund that includes Amazon stock have sued the company, its founder Jeff Bezos, and its board of directors for "breaching their fiduciary duty" as part of a contract to acquire launch services for the Project Kuiper megaconstellation.

The lawsuit, filed on Thursday and first reported by the Delaware Business Court Insider, alleges that in purchasing launches for Kuiper, Amazon failed to consider SpaceX and its Falcon 9 rocket. This was the only prudent choice that would have enabled Amazon to launch half of its constellation by a 2026 deadline, the lawsuit states.

The plaintiffs say that the Falcon 9 costs less than its competitors and has other advantages, such as being available now. Nevertheless, the lawsuit alleges, SpaceX was never considered due to an intense and personal rivalry between that launch company's founder, Elon Musk, and Bezos, who has a competing rocket company in Blue Origin.

"Given these factors, Amazon’s persistent refusal to even consider SpaceX—and the Board’s failure to question its exclusion—lays bare the extent to which Bezos’ personal rivalry influenced Amazon’s procurement process," the lawsuit states."

Pass the popcorn! As much as I hate Musk - and Bezos, for that matter - I'll bet he split a gut when he read about this.

https://arstechnica.com/space/2023/09/pension-fund-sues-jeff-bezos-and-amazon-for-not-using-falcon-9-rockets/

Comments

[thewayne]

SMH

[disneydream06]

Boys have too much money. UGH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

That said, on another note, I wonder which company/government is going to break outer space by putting up one too many satellites. :o :o :o
Hugs, Jon

[thewayne]

It's already getting complicated and crowded since very few satellites are capable of de-orbiting themselves and the amount of debris up there is increasing.

[disneydream06]

I want to say this country has a bunch of IDIOTS, but I guess in this case it's not just us this time. :o :o :o

[silveradept]

This feels like a lawsuit that should expose the complete ridiculousness of what it means to be a publicly traded company and what kinds of terrible decisions can be inflicted on a corporation because the shareholders demand maximum profit at all times and in all decisions. It'll be interesting to watch the suit play out, but I feel like there should be some kind of "really?" attached to it that indicates how bizarre it is.

[thewayne]

This has been a problem with Wall Street for quite some time.  It used to be that playing the stock market was speculative.  Now it's expected to be guaranteed return.  It shouldn't be that way.  Pension funds need to invest in safe returns, I don't think they should be investing in things like satellite internet!

[silveradept]

Safe investments don't make enough yield to cover the withdrawals from the retirees. Now, maybe, if enough people were being paid enough that they could regularly invest in retirement funds and set aside some wages for that, them maybe the funds wouldn't have to pursue aggressive targets and demand guaranteed yields of that amount.

[thewayne]

I believe it was the Ohio teacher's retirement fund moved their fund to a group of Private Equity Fund twits.  They charged such high fees that it effectively drained the fund and the teachers weren't making enough to retire upon.  As the Fresh Air on PEFs mentioned, a lot of retirement boards don't have people with financial savvy on them, and they can easily get suckered into PEF sales pitches without understanding the fees being charged.

[silveradept]

And, of course, they blamed the people investing in them for not understanding what they were getting into, rather than anybody blaming the predators who make things deliberately look good and hide the bad things behind legalese and other such things they know nobody will read or understand unless they want to employee someone as their agent to look out for them.