Space Man Peter Beck Makes Annual Bloomberg 50

“In high school a guidance counsellor told Peter Beck that a career building rockets was ‘absurdly unachievable’. And it did take the New Zealander a while to realise his teenage dream. For more than a decade he worked on designs for spacecraft only when he wasn’t busy with his job engineering supercomputers, wind turbines, and other products – a gig he got despite not having a formal university education,” Bloomberg reports, including Rocket Lab’s Beck in its annual list of individuals “meriting a nod” in 2021.

“Now blasting payloads into space is all in a day’s work.

“So far [Beck’s company Rocket Lab] been successfully launched 21 times, the second-highest number for any private space vehicle after SpaceX’s Falcon 9, with 125.

“But there’s a key difference: Unlike with SpaceX, which remains privately held, ordinary investors can now bet on Beck’s vision. Since Rocket Lab’s initial public offering, the stock is up 56 per cent.”

Original article by Bloomberg, December 1, 2021.