A billionaire tech friendship burgeons on X between Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos

• Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos exchanged friendly tweets after the rocket launches on Thursday.
• The billionaires have a long-running rivalry over space ambitions and more.
• Their recent interactions suggest a possible end to their long-running public feud.

Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos may no longer be enemies. Moreover, a friendship could well arise between the two billionaires, judging by the tweets they recently posted on X.

Both technology founders own rocket companies that launched missions Thursday, with mixed results.

SpaceX’s massive Starship spacecraft exploded, although its Super Heavy rocket booster successfully returned to a platform on Earth.

“@elonmusk Congratulations to you and the entire SpaceX team on the flawless capture of the booster! Very impressive.” Bezos wrote about

Earlier today, Bezos’ Blue Origin launched its 32-story New Glenn rocket into orbit. He lost his booster during the test flight.

“Well done, @JeffBezos and the Blue Origin team!” Musk wrote.

Is their long feud over?

Subscribers on X were quick to notice the sea change in the relationship between billionaires.

Musk and Bezos have been embroiled in a years-long feud.

They argued over their space ambitions at SpaceX and Blue Origin as they repeatedly outdid each other for the title of world’s richest person. It’s a title that Elon Musk currently holds by a wide margin: with Bloomberg estimating his net worth at $439 billion, he is by far the richest person in the world. Bezos comes in second, with an estimated net worth of $240 billion.

Musk has said Blue Origin tried to poach talent from SpaceX, and he has taunted Bezos repeatedly over the status of their respective companies.

In 2015, when SpaceX landed its Falcon 9 spacecraft, Bezos criticized Musk on Twitter by suggesting that Blue Origin had already accomplished a similar feat.

Bezos has also subtly criticized Musk’s mission to colonize Mars over the years. When NASA chose SpaceX for a major contract in 2021, Blue Origin was furious and protested the decision.

Less than two months ago, they did it again. In an X post, Musk said that Bezos had told people to get rid of their shares in his companies because Donald Trump was doomed to lose the presidential election.

Hours later, Bezos said the claim was “100% false.”

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The billionaire “half-brothers”

It’s this story that made Thursday’s friendly repartee between the billionaires so shocking.

Musk posted a gif of X from the movie “Step Brothers,” with the main characters saying, “Did we just become best friends? Yeah!”

“Step Brothers is the perfect meme for @JeffBezos and me,” Musk wrote.

He posted another clip from the same film, implying that his relationship with Bezos was now harmonious.

Of course, all of this takes place on social media, which has its limits. But one thing is certain: No matter what happens behind the scenes or offline, Thursday’s exchanges mark a shift in Bezos and Musk’s online relationship.