Thunder Lozenge

Thanks to Eric Weder for the link.

It's an ugly looking thing, but is only a first stage as I understand it. Replace the top with something like the Shepard which would then achieve orbit. Once in orbit, that second stage would become a SSTO for lower gravity rocks like the moon. For a billionaire, Jeff Bezos and Blue Origin does seem to be moving kind of slow, but then, they do have hardware flying so I won't give them too much grief.

That a supersonic flight instability destroyed it suggests they may need to rethink the shape of their vehicle.

SpaceX, as Mr. Musk's company is known, is years behind in testing its Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon space capsule

...the article says. I don't know (well, yeah I do.) Blue Origins was formed a few years before SpaceX, yet SpaceX has already been to orbit and retrieved their capsule in a spectacular (redefining the meaning of nominal) example of what they could do.

Going from suborbital to orbital is a big deal.