Everyday AstronautPublicly thanking Paul G. Allen, who admitted to investing more than $20 million in the project, Rutan appeared to physically choke up when he said, "We were able to develop a complete space program from scratch for the price of one of those government paper studies.".
by Scott Gourley
June 21 2004
Popular Mechanics
reprised from
And of course they achieved orbit and remained there for two weeks, rendezvoused with the International Space Station, and didn't use any technology pioneered by NASA, all for $20 million.