Blue Origin was the first private spaceflight company to launch a rocket into space and then bring it back down for a vertical landing. "Into space" has a bit of a caveat attached, though; the New Shepard rocket crossed the Karman line, 100 kilometers above ground, which arbitrarily divides earth from space. The rocket can't make it high enough to deliver a payload into orbit the way SpaceX's Falcon 9 can.

But those caveats could go away in a few years. In an email today, Blue Origin (and Amazon.com) founder Jeff Bezos revealed plans for a new rocket series named New Glenn. Named after the first American to orbit Earth, New Glenn is also destined for orbital space, and Blue Origin wants to launch it before the end of the decade.