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These were only safe after one of those billionaires actually proved it. Before SpaceX and Tesla, both these things were considered untenable.

I suspect the Nissan Leaf would have happened with or without Tesla.

Blue Origin predates SpaceX.

And still has not reached orbit

> were considered untenable.

The billionaire space race starts before SpaceX, largely from/around the Ansari X Prize (Bezos, Paul Allen).