Nearly a quarter of a century after its founding, Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin is preparing to launch an orbital rocket for the first time - and finally enter the fiercely competitive launch industry currently dominated by SpaceX.

Company executives have maintained that they plan to launch the rocket, called New Glenn, before the end of the year. However, an air traffic advisory issued last week suggested Blue Origin could launch before January 6.

Regardless, the company has little left in the way of pre-launch testing or paperwork: Blue Origin last week received a launch license for New Glenn from federal regulators for a five-year period. On the same day, the company also successfully conducted a launch rehearsal, known as the hot fire test. Blue Origin CEO David Limp confirmed that all that remains on the checklist is attaching the fairing, which carries the rocket's payload.

When the rocket finally lifts off, seven Blue Origin-built BE-4 engines will ignite to produce more than 3.8 million pounds of thrust, propelling the rocket away from the launch pad in Cape Canaveral, Florida. The 320-foot-tall rocket will carry proven technology from Blue Origin's Blue Ring spacecraft, an orbital transfer vehicle designed to provide transportation, logistics and satellite services.

New Glenn and Blue Ring are just two of several products Blue Origin is developing to compete in multiple areas of the space industry. The company ultimately hopes to compete with multiple competitors, not just SpaceX's Falcon 9 (which currently launches the majority of national security and commercial satellite payloads), that are developing lunar landers, private space stations and more.

So far, Blue Origin is mainly known for its New Shepard suborbital rocket;

If all goes according to plan, New Glenn's booster will return to Earth and land vertically on a floating barge, where it will be refurbished and reused up to 25 times. NASA also selected Blue Origin to launch the Gemini spacecraft to Mars - the satellites were supposed to be launched on this first mission, but because the launch was postponed from October, the space agency decided to relaunch the satellites on a later New Glenn launch. Blue Origin also has launch agreements with the Space Force, Amazon's Project Kuiper and other commercial companies.