Jeff Bezos has described a recent explosion of his space company's rocket as a “gut punch” – but insisted that artificial intelligence will create a labour shortage, not mass redundancy. The Amazon founder made the remarks at Europe's largest tech expo, VivaTech in Paris, where he also outlined ambitions to colonise the Moon.
The explosion in May involved an uncrewed New Glenn rocket at Cape Canaveral in Florida. “It was a gut punch for the whole team. But what we’ve learned since then is we got really lucky,” Bezos told the audience. No injuries were reported, and critical launch infrastructure – including propellant and fuel systems – survived what could have been a far more damaging incident.
“Jeff Bezos predicts AI will create a labour shortage, after his New Glenn rocket exploded in Florida.”
Bezos then pivoted to artificial intelligence, pushing back against warnings from figures such as former UK prime minister Rishi Sunak, now an adviser to Microsoft and Anthropic, who recently said AI was affecting young people's job prospects. “I know there’s a lot of concern that many people have, including many smart people, that AI is going to make humans redundant and so on,” Bezos said. “I totally disagree with this point of view. And I think, in fact, AI is going to create a labour shortage.”
He painted an optimistic picture, suggesting that people are limited not by a lack of ambition but by barriers that technology can help remove. His new AI venture, Prometheus, is focused on accelerating physical manufacturing – a sector becoming increasingly automated. The UK’s Trades Union Congress has warned that AI could repeat “the disaster of deindustrialisation” as shareholders get richer while jobs are “degraded or displaced”. But it added that AI could have transformative potential if developed properly, and workers could benefit from productivity gains.
Bezos also used his appearance to outline a long-term vision for space. He described space as “supply constrained, not demand constrained”, arguing that access remains the biggest obstacle. “We’re going to the Moon to stay, not just to visit,” he said, adding that technologies such as electrolysis could eventually allow lunar resources to refuel rockets and support a permanent presence beyond Earth.