Billionaire space race the 2016 International Astronautical Congress in Guadalajara, Mexico, Blue Origin President Rob Meyerson elaborated on the Bezos vision previously outlined in the New Glenn announcement. The Blue Origin New Armstrong would be similar in function to the SpaceX Interplanetary Transport System that Elon Musk unveiled at the same conference. Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic are in the same market, suborbital space tourism, with New Shepard and SpaceShipTwo (Tier 1b), respectively. They are in a race to be first to launch paying customers on short spaceshots, with rival technological philosophies of space capsules and spaceplanes, respectively Virgin Galactic and SpaceX support
Virgin Samoa Virgin Australia decided to relinquish its New Zealand Air Operators Certificate with all New Zealand registered aircraft, including the Virgin Samoa branded aircraft, transferred to the Australian register. In May 2017, the Prime Minister of Samoa, Tuilaepa Aiono Sailele Malielegaoi, wrote to Virgin Australia advising of the government’s intention to withdraw from the joint venture. This followed two years of the government's unhappiness that Samoan customers and government were not obtaining enough of the benefits from the joint venture. Virgin Australia later confirmed that services would cease on 12 November 2017. The government proposes Polynesian Airlines resume operating long distance