{"id":17259,"date":"2023-09-25T19:40:22","date_gmt":"2023-09-25T11:40:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/departing-amazon-exec-dave-limp-will-become-ceo-at-jeff-bezos-blue-origin-space-venture\/"},"modified":"2023-09-25T19:40:22","modified_gmt":"2023-09-25T11:40:22","slug":"departing-amazon-exec-dave-limp-will-become-ceo-at-jeff-bezos-blue-origin-space-venture","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/departing-amazon-exec-dave-limp-will-become-ceo-at-jeff-bezos-blue-origin-space-venture\/","title":{"rendered":"Departing Amazon exec Dave Limp will become CEO at Jeff Bezos\u2019 Blue Origin space venture"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"
Blue Origin\u2019s next CEO, Dave Limp, speaks at 2019\u2019s GeekWire Summit. (GeekWire Photo \/ Kevin Lisota)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Blue Origin has confirmed that Dave Limp, who is leaving his post as Amazon\u2019s senior vice president of devices and services, will take over as the CEO of Jeff Bezos\u2019 privately held space venture.<\/p>\n

The current CEO, longtime aerospace executive Bob Smith, is retiring from the post but will stay on with Blue Origin until January to help with the transition, a company spokesperson told GeekWire in an email.<\/p>\n

Limp presided over Amazon\u2019s Echo hardware line and its Alexa voice assistant business, among other initiatives. The most relevant initiative for Blue Origin would be his oversight of Amazon\u2019s Project Kuiper satellite project, which is due to have its first prototype satellites launched as soon as next month.<\/p>\n

Those satellites will be sent into low Earth orbit on United Launch Alliance\u2019s Atlas V rocket, but Blue Origin is a major contractor for the Kuiper launches to come.<\/p>\n

Reports about the transition began percolating out on social media today, after Blue Origin distributed internal memos to the company\u2019s staff. In today\u2019s emailed statement, Kent, Wash.-based Blue Origin praised Limp\u2019s record at Amazon.<\/p>\n

\u201cDave is a proven innovator with a customer-first mindset. He has extensive experience in the high-tech industry and growing highly complex organizations, including leading Amazon\u2019s Kuiper, Kindle, Alexa, Zoox, Fire TV and many other businesses,\u201d Blue Origin\u2019s statement noted.<\/p>\n

\"Blue
Blue Origin CEO Bob Smith shows a video of a BE-4 rocket engine firing during the Aerospace Futures Alliance Summit in 2018. (GeekWire Photo \/ Alan Boyle)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The statement also paid tribute to Smith\u2019s leadership: \u201cIn his six years, Bob led Blue Origin\u2019s transformation from an R&D-focused company into a multifaceted space business nearing $10 billion in customer orders and over 10,000 employees. Dave will join in December, and Bob will be here through January 2 to ensure a smooth transition.\u201d<\/p>\n

Under Smith\u2019s watch, Blue Origin began sending spacefliers \u2014 including Bezos \u2014 on suborbital trips using its New Shepard rocket ship. The company also ramped up efforts to build its orbital-class New Glenn rocket and unveiled the Orbital Reef space station project. This year, Blue Origin and its partners won a $3.4 billion contract to work on a lunar lander for NASA\u2019s use, after losing out to SpaceX for an earlier contract.<\/p>\n

For what it\u2019s worth, Smith\u2019s tenure has also been marked by controversy, including internal acrimony over Blue Origin\u2019s COVID policies and concerns relating to safety and sexual harassment.<\/p>\n

If Limp\u2019s tenure lasts as long as Smith\u2019s, he could oversee the resumption of crewed suborbital space trips after a yearlong hiatus, as well as the start of Blue Origin\u2019s orbital space program and its participation in missions to the moon.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Amazon is expected to name longtime Microsoft executive Panos Panay to take Limp\u2019s place as its devices and services chief. Microsoft announced Panay\u2019s departure just last week.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Blue Origin\u2019s next CEO, Dave Limp, speaks at 2019\u2019s GeekWire Summit. (GeekWire Photo \/ Kevin Lisota) Blue Origin has confirmed that Dave Limp, who is leaving his post as Amazon\u2019s senior vice president of devices and services, will take over as the CEO of Jeff Bezos\u2019 privately held space venture. The current CEO, longtime aerospace […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[275,509,4536,719,21,4396],"class_list":["post-17259","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-amazon","tag-blue-origin","tag-bob-smith","tag-dave-limp","tag-space","tag-tech-moves"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17259"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17259"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17259\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17259"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17259"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17259"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}