Shrugging off bad weather, Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin launched its powerful New Glenn rocket on its maiden flight early Thursday, lighting up a cloudy overnight sky as it climbed away from Cape Canaveral in a high-stakes bid to compete with Elon Musk's industry-leading SpaceX.

Jeff Bezos, the second-richest man in the world, behind Tesla CEO Elon Musk, boasts a net worth of $247.6 billion, according to Forbes' Real-Time Billionaires List, is known for his philanthropic efforts,

Blue Origin, the private space company owned by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, has pulled a major test of its rocket.

Billionaire tech CEOs Jeff Bezos of Amazon, Mark Zuckerberg of Meta, Sundar Pichai of Google, Tim Cook of Apple, and Elon Musk got prime seats at President Trump’s inauguration in the Capitol

The company, started by the Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, reset its countdown clock repeatedly over a period of just over two hours before eventually postponing the test flight to another day.

Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin called off the debut launch of its massive new rocket early Monday because of technical trouble.

The 320-ft New Glenn rocket was supposed to blast off before dawn, but launch controllers had to deal with an unspecified rocket issue in the final minutes of the countdown

The two tech titans, known to be at loggerheads, seem to be warming up to each other thanks to their rocketry journey with SpaceX and Blue Origin.

The uncrewed New Glenn rocket took off at 2:03 a.m. EST from Complex 36 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, Blue Origin said.

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos has faced criticism since killing a Washington Post endorsement of Kamala Harris in the election against Donald Trump.

Founded 25 years ago by Bezos, Blue Origin has been launching paying passengers to the edge of space since 2021, including himself. The short hops from Texas use smaller rockets named after the first American in space, Alan Shepard. New Glenn, which honors John Glenn, is five times taller.

President Trump is targeting people who have been living in the country under Biden immigration programs that shielded them from deportation and allowed them to work.