Following Aerojet’s acquisition of Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne in 2012, Blue Origin president Rob Meyerson saw an opportunity to fill a gap in the defense industrial base.

[3] Blue Origin publicly entered the liquid rocket engine business by partnering with ULA on the development of the BE-4, and working with other companies.

[3] Meyerson announced the selection of Huntsville, AL as the location of Blue Origin’s rocket production factory in June 2017.

[6] The BE-3 was successfully tested in late 2013 on a full-duration simulated suborbital burn, with coast phases and engine relights, "demonstrating deep throttle, full power, long-duration and reliable restart all in a single-test sequence.

[8] As of December 2013[update], the engine had "demonstrated more than 160 starts and 9,100 seconds (152 min) of operation at Blue Origin's test facility near Van Horn, Texas.

"[7][9] Additional testing of the BE-3 was completed in 2014, with the engine "simulating a sub-scale booster suborbital mission duty cycle.

[11][12] In the event, Blue Origin made the first flight test of the BE-3PM[12][11] engine on the New Shepard suborbital vehicle before the month was out, flying a boost profile to 93,500 meters (307,000 ft) altitude on 29 April 2015.

Wells capsule suffered an un-contained engine failure that resulted in the triggering of a launch abort and the loss of the vehicle.