Amazon founder Jeff Bezos to fly to space

Bezos — who recently stepped down as Amazon's CEO — will be one of six people on the flight.

The company's six-seater capsule and 59-foot rocket will tear toward the edge of space on an 11-minute flight that'll reach more than 60 miles above Earth.

Blue Origin has spent the better part of the last decade running the New Shepard rocket through a series of successful test flights that have been fully automated and, thus far, carried no humans.

If all goes according to plan, Bezos — the world's richest person with a net worth of $187 billion — will be the second of the billionaire space tycoons to experience a ride aboard the rocket technology that he's poured millions into developing. Richard Branson flew to space earlier this month aboard a supersonic space plane developed by his company, Virgin Galactic.