Elon Musk | History | Biography & Facts | SpaceX | Tesla | Twitter | Net Worth
Elon Musk (born June 28, 1971 in Pretoria, South Africa) is
a South African-born American entrepreneur who cofounded PayPal and founded
SpaceX, And Twitter a manufacturer of launch vehicles and spacecraft. He was also one of
the first significant investors in, and the CEO of, the electric vehicle
manufacturer Tesla.
Early life
Musk was born in South Africa to a South African father and
a Canadian mother. He demonstrated an early aptitude for computers and
entrepreneurship. He created a video game at the age of 12 and sold it to a
computer magazine. Musk left South Africa in 1988, after obtaining a Canadian
passport, because he was unwilling to support apartheid through compulsory
military service and sought the greater economic opportunities available in the
United States.
PayPal and SpaceX
Musk attended Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario,
before transferring to the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia in 1992,
where he earned bachelor’s degrees in physics and economics in 1997. He
enrolled in graduate physics at Stanford University in California, but left
after only two days because he believed that the Internet had far greater
potential to change society than physics work. In 1995, he founded Zip2, a
company that provided online newspapers with maps and business directories.
Zip2 was purchased by computer manufacturer Compaq for $307 million in 1999,
and Musk then founded X.com, which later became PayPal, which specialised in
online money transfers. PayPal was purchased by eBay for $1.5 billion in 2002.
Musk has long believed that in order for life to survive,
humanity must evolve into a multiplanet species. He was, however, dissatisfied
with the high cost of rocket launchers. He founded Space Exploration Technologies
(SpaceX) in 2002 to create more affordable rockets. Its first two rockets, the
Falcon 1 (launched in 2006) and the larger Falcon 9 (launched in 2010), were
designed to be much less expensive than competing rockets. The Falcon Heavy
(first launched in 2018) rocket was designed to carry 117,000 pounds (53,000
kg) to orbit, nearly twice as much as its closest competitor, the Boeing
Company’s Delta IV Heavy, for one-third the price. The Super Heavy-Starship
system is SpaceX’s successor to the Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy. The first stage
of the Super Heavy would be capable of lifting 100,000 kg (220,000 pounds) into
low Earth orbit. The payload would be the Starship, a spacecraft designed for
rapid transportation between cities on Earth as well as the establishment of
bases on the Moon and Mars. SpaceX also created the Dragon spacecraft, which
transports supplies to and from the International Space Station (ISS). Dragon
can transport up to seven astronauts, and in 2020, it flew astronauts Doug
Hurley and Robert Behnken to the International Space Station. The Super
Heavy-Starship system’s first test flights will take place in 2020.. Musk was
not only the CEO of SpaceX, but he was also the chief designer of the Falcon
rockets, Dragon, and Starship. As part of NASA’s Artemis space programme,
SpaceX has been contracted to build the lander for astronauts returning to the
Moon by 2025.
Tesla
Musk had long been intrigued by the potential of electric
vehicles, and in 2004, he became one of the major backers of Tesla Motors
(later renamed Tesla), an electric vehicle company founded by entrepreneurs
Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning. Tesla introduced its first car, the
Roadster, in 2006, which could travel 245 miles (394 kilometres) on a single
charge. It was a sports car that could go from 0 to 60 miles (97 km) per hour
in less than four seconds, in contrast to most previous electric vehicles,
which Musk thought were stodgy and uninteresting.. The company’s initial public
offering in 2010 raised approximately $226 million. Tesla introduced the Model
S sedan two years later, which was praised by automotive critics for its
performance and design. The Model X luxury SUV, which hit the market in 2015,
earned the company even more praise. The Model 3, a more affordable vehicle,
was introduced in 2017 and quickly became the best-selling electric vehicle of
all time.
Dissatisfied with the projected cost of a high-speed rail
system in California ($68 billion), Musk proposed the Hyperloop in 2013, a
pneumatic tube in which a pod carrying 28 passengers would travel the 350 miles
(560 km) between Los Angeles and San Francisco in 35 minutes at a top speed of
760 miles (1,220 km/h), nearly the speed of sound. Musk claimed that the
Hyperloop would be $6 billion and that, with pods departing every two minutes
on average, the system would be able to accommodate the six million people who
travel that route each year. However, he stated that due to his
responsibilities at SpaceX and Tesla, he was unable to devote time to the
Hyperloop’s development.
Musk joined the social media platform Twitter in 2009, and
as @elonmusk, he quickly became one of the site’s most popular accounts, with
more than 85 million followers as of 2022. He expressed concerns about Tesla’s
public float, and in August 2018 he tweeted about taking the company private
for $420 per share, noting that he had “secured funding.” (The $420
value was seen as a joking reference to April 20, a day celebrated by cannabis
devotees.) The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) sued Musk the
following month for securities fraud, alleging that the tweets were “false
and misleading.” Shortly after, Tesla’s board of directors rejected the
SEC’s proposed settlement., According to reports, Musk threatened to resign.
However, the news caused Tesla stock to plummet, and a harsher deal was
eventually accepted. Its terms included Musk stepping down as chairman for
three years, though he could continue as CEO; his tweets had to be preapproved
by Tesla lawyers; and fines of $20 million were imposed on both Tesla and Musk.
In light of the company’s content-moderation policies, Musk
questioned Twitter’s commitment to free speech principles. Twitter’s SEC filings
in early April 2022 revealed that Musk had purchased more than 9% of the
company. Shortly after, Twitter announced that Musk would join the company’s
board of directors, but Musk declined and instead made a $44 billion bid for
the entire company, valued at $54.20 per share. The deal was approved by
Twitter’s board of directors, making him the sole owner of the company. Musk
stated that his company’s plans include “improving the product with new
features, making the algorithms open source to increase trust, defeating spam
bots, and authenticating all humans.” Musk announced his withdrawal of his
bid in July 2022, claiming that Twitter had not provided enough information
about bot accounts and that the company was in “material breach of
multiple provisions” of the purchase agreement. Twitter’s board chair,
Bret Taylor, responded by saying that the company was “committed to
closing the transaction on the price and terms agreed upon with Mr. Musk.”
Twitter sued Musk in order to compel him to buy the company. Twitter
shareholders voted in September 2022 to accept Musk’s offer. Despite facing a
legal battle, Musk went ahead with the transaction, which was completed in
October.
