Elon Musk - biography and reasons for success. Elon Musk: biography, personal life, career, net worth
They call him Tony Stark real world, a worthy heir to Bill Gates and Steve Jobs rolled into one. An entrepreneur who made his fortune from Internet startups has turned into a visionary who thinks about a better future for humanity. With little understanding of online banking, rocket science or electric cars, Elon Musk has time and again broken into a new industry with the confidence that he knows better than anyone what customers want. And it turned out that he really knew!
African childhood
Elon Musk was born on June 28, 1971 in Pretoria, South Africa. His father Errol was a successful engineer from a respected family. May's mother was a model in her youth and then a successful nutritionist. Elon was the first child in the family. Next came brother Kimbal and sister Tosca (future director and producer). Although Elon's parents knew each other since childhood and Errol sought May's hand for many years, their marriage was not happy. When Elon turned seven, the couple filed for divorce.
At first, the children stayed with their mother, but then Elon moved in with his father. As he himself later recalled, his mother had three children left, and his father had no one; he looked lonely and sad. Soon Kimbal moved in with his father. Subsequently, the brothers more than once doubted their decision: Errol turned out to be strict and demanding, it was difficult for him to please. Nevertheless he gave his sons a good education and instilled a love for the exact sciences.
Elon was different from other children. He was smarter than his peers and did not share their interest in sports and entertainment. The boy often “disconnected” from the outside world, plunging into himself. His classmates bullied him. Musk changed several schools, but never made real friends.
Problems at school and at home led Musk to early years sought refuge in books. In his youth, he read the novels of Verne, Asimov, Heinlein and Tolkien. “The Academy” and “The Moon is a Harsh Mistress” awakened his interest in space, and Douglas Adams’s novel “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” helped him cope with an identity crisis at the age of fourteen. Since then, Musk has been guided by the principle “The main thing is to ask the right questions.”
Musk's second hobby was computers. As soon as he encountered this miracle of technology, he begged his father for his first computer - a Commodore VIC-20, a popular model in the early eighties with as much as five kilobytes of memory. Musk mastered programming himself and, at the age of twelve, wrote the video game Blastar, which he sold to one of the local magazines for five hundred dollars.
Although Errol bought his son a computer, he himself was skeptical about Elon’s hobby, considering computers just expensive toys. He wanted Elon to become an engineer like himself. The lack of support and prospects made Elon think about emigrating. He dreamed of America, which seemed to him a country unlimited possibilities for the smart and resourceful. Taking advantage of the fact that his mother was a native of Canada, Musk received Canadian citizenship and at the age of seventeen set off to conquer America.
American Dream: Zip2
At first it was not easy in the new place. In the first years, Elon constantly moved, doing menial work until he settled on a farm with relatives. Soon May and Kimbal moved to Canada. Elon entered Queens University in Ontario, where he continued to study programming. According to him, he chose Queens because among his listeners there were the most girls. The calculation was fully justified - at the university, Elon met his future wife, Justine.
After receiving his diploma, Musk entered the University of Pennsylvania master's program in physics and economics. At that time he was already interested in space, alternative energy and Internet startups. After Pennsylvania, Musk went to Stanford (California) to get his doctorate, but two days later he dropped out and opened his first business in Silicon Valley with his brother.
In the mid-nineties, shares of Internet companies grew by leaps and bounds, and Musk simply could not stay away. Elon came up with the idea of creating Zip2 - a digital analogue of the Yellow Pages, which allowed, as he put it, to find the nearest pizzeria in any area of San Francisco and find out how to get to it.
At first, the Musks faced a problem: no one wanted to invest money in their endeavor. Most companies still had no idea why they needed their own website and why advertising on the Internet was worth it. The father helped the brothers by sending twenty-eight thousand dollars. This was enough to rent a small office, purchase equipment and the necessary licenses. For the first three months, Elon and Kimbal lived in the office: they had no money to rent housing. The only furniture they had was a couple of mattresses.
The brothers divided powers: Elon almost never left the office, spending all his time on improving products, while Kimbal was looking for clients. At first, he simply walked around the area and offered his services to hairdressers, car dealerships, restaurants and shops. Someone managed to get interested. They started talking about Zip2, the company got investors, and things took off.
But the new shareholders doubted the young entrepreneur’s ability to manage his own venture and invited a more experienced manager, Rich Sorkin. Sorkin decided to place emphasis differently: now Zip2 mainly supplied software for newspapers, and Musk himself wanted to focus on working with consumers. He tried to remove Sorkin and take his place, but the board of directors did not support Elon.
The point of fighting soon disappeared. The large company Compac acquired Zip2 for $307 million, of which Elon personally went to $22 million. At twenty-seven years old, he became a millionaire. Of course, he bought an apartment and a luxury car, but most spent money on a new project.
If you have millions of dollars, it changes your lifestyle - those who say otherwise are blatantly lying. I no longer need to work to survive. But I work every day, even on weekends, and I haven't been on vacation for several years.
Elon Musk
X.com and PayPal
Working on Zip2 taught Elon a lesson. He gained self-confidence and turned from a timid programmer into a confident businessman. But most importantly, Musk realized that he should no longer lose control over his projects. After selling Zip2, he was attracted to an industry where there was a lot of money and problems that could be fixed with the help of the Internet. It was about banking sector, which at the time was cumbersome, clunky and short-sighted and did not understand the possibilities of the digital era.
Having spent his own 12 million, Elon created the first ever online banking service with the pornographic name X.com. Musk was not afraid that many technologies had to be invented from scratch. He was confident that he would revolutionize the banking industry, and his confidence attracted investors, and then clients, to him. The ability to transfer money with a couple of mouse clicks without filling out long payment orders attracted two hundred thousand people to the service in just a few months.
Robert Downey Jr. admitted that his portrayal of Tony Stark was partially based on Musk, and persuaded Elon to make a cameo in Iron Man 2.
Soon X.com had its first serious competitor in the person of the equally young and ambitious startup Confinity, which was run by Max Levchin and Peter Thiel. Companies spent a lot of effort and money fighting until they came to the conclusion that it was easier to join forces. The largest shareholder and manager of the new company was Elon Musk, who never learned to get along with people. Quarrels began between Elon and Levchin and Til. The reason was the name of the merged company - everyone liked the name PayPal proposed by the founders of Confinity, and only Musk clung to X.com.
As a result of the conflict, Thiel left the company, and Levchin began to threaten that he would follow him. Technical problems also began: the servers could not cope with the influx of clients, “holes” were discovered in the programs, which threatened fines from banks. Dissatisfaction with Musk was brewing within the company. Taking advantage of the absence of Elon, who finally married Justine and went to Honeymoon, the board of directors removed him from his position and appointed Peter Thiel to this place.
Musk interrupted the trip and tried to fight, but soon cooled down, realizing that Levchin and Thiel really knew their stuff. He remained a shareholder of the company and continued to invest money in it. When the largest online auction site eBay wanted to acquire PayPal, not a single board member had any doubts that they had to agree, but Musk advised them to remain patient and wait. Finally, after a series of refusals, in June 2002, eBay offered one and a half billion dollars. As the largest shareholder, Musk received 250 million.
The X.com story had a double impact on Musk's reputation. On the one hand, he earned the reputation of a genius who created a unique product from scratch. On the other hand, he again could not get along with his partners and made a number of mistakes in managing the company. Some say that if Elon had remained at the helm for a few more months, the company would have collapsed. Others argue that he didn't have enough time - although many of Musk's ideas seem absurd at first glance, time proves him right.
SpaceX and Tesla Motors
After leaving PayPal, Musk resumed his honeymoon. On the trip, he contracted a dangerous form of malaria and almost died. It took six months to fully recover, during which time Elon lost twenty kilograms.
Shortly before the PayPal sale, Elon and Justine had their first child. But the parents' happiness was short-lived - the child died from the so-called sudden infant death syndrome. Musk dealt with grief in his typical manner - he threw himself into work. Colleagues later recalled that work difficulties sometimes brought tears to Elon’s eyes, but he endured this loss in silence. Musk did not like to put his personal life on display.
Having finally become convinced of the dangers of rest, Musk returned to work. As his influence at PayPal dwindled, Elon recalled his childhood fascination with space. Musk felt that the world had lost faith in a better future, and wanted to inspire humanity to new achievements. At first, Musk's plans were very naive - he was going to buy an old Russian ballistic missile and with its help send a ship to Mars. The project failed - Musk did not agree on a price with the sellers. Then he came up with the idea of producing small, cost-effective rockets that could conquer the market for commercial transportation to orbit due to low launch costs.
At that time, Musk knew nothing about rocket science. He had little idea of the scale of the work, so he set himself overly optimistic deadlines that were impossible to meet. Critics often accused Musk of lying, but Musk sincerely believed in his words and worked tirelessly to put his words into practice. He expected the same attitude from his employees, so people who were not ready to work twelve to sixteen hours a day did not stay long with Musk.
In June 2002, he founded Space Exploration Technologies Corporation (SpaceX). At first, Musk wanted to produce only engines and purchase other parts from third-party suppliers. But he quickly became convinced that acceptable quality could only be achieved by himself.
At the same time, Musk became interested in electric vehicles. Two acquaintances prompted him to do this - first, Elon met the talented engineer Jeffrey Strobel, who was working on an economical battery for an electric car, and then crossed paths with Martin Eberhard and Mark Tarpenning, the founders of Tesla Motors, whose goal was to create a new generation electric car. Musk fell in love with the idea and invested seven million in Tesla, becoming the largest shareholder. At the same time, the operational management of the company remained in the hands of Eberhard and Tarpenning.
The first two Tesla Roadster prototypes were met with enthusiasm, and orders began to pour into the company. But the attempt to move from piece production to mass production almost led to collapse.
Musk financed both enterprises from his own pocket and therefore found himself on the verge of bankruptcy. Funds in Musk's accounts were dwindling, and work on SpaceX's first rocket, the Falcon 1, was four years behind schedule. The first three Falcon 1 launches ended in failure. A series of launch failures is not uncommon in the space industry, but SpaceX could not afford such luxury. The engineers corrected all the shortcomings and the fourth launch was successful, but there was no money left for the fifth.
NASA has a stupid policy that says mistakes are not tolerated. In my company, failure is possible. If things don't fall apart, you're not inventing well enough.
Elon Musk
Tesla founder Martin Eberhard (Nicki Dugan / Flickr)
Things were even worse at Tesla. Contractors constantly disrupted the supply of parts, costs rose, and the public began to lose patience. The cost of one car, according to optimistic forecasts, was 170–200 thousand dollars, and Tesla planned to sell the Roadster for 85 thousand. Musk became disillusioned with Eberhard's leadership and ousted him. Martin took the dismissal hard and launched a media campaign against Musk. Their relationship remained tense, but Eberhard later admitted that without Musk, Tesla would have gone bankrupt at the very beginning.
Difficult times have come in Elon's life. No one seriously believed in the success of his endeavors, and the constant failures of SpaceX and Tesla did not strengthen his reputation. Rumors about the companies' financial problems leaked to the press.
Rolled downhill and personal life. For Elon, family always came second after work. Although Elon and Justine had known each other for many years and raised five children, she always felt that she was something of an accessory for her husband. Their marriage reached a dead end, and Elon filed for divorce. Musk treated the divorce process as a business project and sought the most convenient result for himself. The press was perplexed why the multimillionaire was arguing with the mother of his five children about the amount of compensation. But Elon could not afford unnecessary expenses.
In December 2008, Musk ran out of money. If Elon had not found the necessary funds by January, Tesla could have been declared bankrupt, and SpaceX employees would have had nothing to pay their salaries. Musk figured that he would have to sacrifice one of the companies to preserve the other, but could not make a choice.
Breakthrough
Musk found the money at the very last moment. He invested the rest of his funds in Tesla and convinced investors to believe in it one more time. And with SpaceX he was just lucky. Musk has long tried to convince NASA that his company could become a contractor for transporting cargo into orbit. And on December 23, 2008, the space agency signed a one and a half billion dollar contract with SpaceX for twelve flights to the ISS.
And here Musk’s undertakings began to work at full capacity, and from a man who promised, promised and promised again for many years, he turned into a man who began to do. Now SpaceX owns several records at once, and Musk does not intend to stop there.
Tesla is also doing well. The Tesla Roadster sold well, but the real hit was the Model S, released in 2012. Tesla Motors positions it as an “iPhone on wheels.” Even distribution is based on the Apple model - Tesla sells cars via the Internet and special sales points located in large shopping centers. Model S owners have virtually no maintenance costs. Programs are automatically updated via the Internet, and owners can charge their cars for free at any Tesla gas station. Or, if they are in a hurry, they can change the battery, but for money. In addition to cars, Tesla produces batteries for electric vehicles of other companies, and the sale of batteries brings in even more income.
Even if the zombie apocalypse happens, you will still be able to travel thanks to gas stations and the Tesla Supercharging system.
Elon Musk
Another of Musk’s undertakings is also succeeding – the SolarCity company, created by Elon and his cousins. SolarCity is one of the largest providers of solar energy in America, last year its assets were valued at $7 billion.
However, Musk’s life cannot be called carefree. He says he has three goals: to provide humanity with clean transportation and energy sources and to help build colonies on other worlds. Elon dreams of dying on Mars. And if the first two tasks are close to completion, then the third is still a long way to go.
Musk considers SpaceX's main goal to be the conquest of other planets solar system. He plans to start with Mars. The Dragon V2 spacecraft, which SpaceX is currently developing for NASA, would ideally be the basis for flights to the Red Planet, but Musk's ambitions extend much further. Recently, the tycoon recalled that to create a colony on Mars, the planet needs to be terraformed. For these purposes, Musk proposes using... thermonuclear weapons. According to his calculations, the explosion of two thermonuclear bombs in the atmosphere near the poles of Mars will trigger a reaction to heat up the planet and ultimately turn it into a more favorable place for people.
I would like to die on Mars. Only, of course, not in case of an unsuccessful landing.
Elon Musk
According to Musk’s calculations, Hyperloop will cost several times less, the capsules will move at short intervals, and the journey between cities will take only half an hour. However, Musk himself does not intend to engage in construction and plans to make the project drawings publicly available. Today, there are several teams ready to bring Elon’s vision to life.
What is he like?
Despite all his successes, Musk is often criticized. The press estimated that since the founding of SpaceX, Tesla and SolarCity, they have received a total of $5 billion in government orders, subsidies and tax breaks. Musk is accused of not having achieved anything without the help of Uncle Sam.
However, even with the help of the state, he achieved what no one else could achieve. And I would hardly have been able to do this if not for my strength of character. Friends say that Musk is strict and sometimes cruel with employees and partners. He doesn't consider other people's feelings at all. Still, SpaceX and Tesla employees are loyal to their boss and say that while he is a social asshole, he knows what he wants and has a knack for inspiring optimism in others. Elon does not tolerate excuses, justifications and delays, but when difficulties arise, he is the first to volunteer to help.
Musk's work week exceeds one hundred hours. He practically lives at work and constantly flies between company offices on a private jet to save time. He strives to be aware of all the problems of his subordinates, and it is normal for him to respond to an email from employees within half an hour, even if it arrives late at night.
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Elon Musk’s ideas seem crazy, but time after time he turns out to be right, it’s just that society does not keep up with his train of thought. In another world, Elon Musk would be perfect for the role of a villain in the next Bond series, but his passion for science, space and science fiction makes it difficult to see him as an unprincipled businessman. He remains a visionary, concerned with a better future for all humanity, living in an era when the brightest minds are thinking about how to cram more cat photos into a social media post.
I love being involved in projects that change the world. The Internet did it, and space will probably change the world more than anything else. If humanity can move beyond the Earth, it is clear that its future lies there.
Elon Musk
In our cynical and calculating age, there are few such ideological dreamers left. Therefore, I want to keep my fingers crossed for Elon Musk and believe that he will succeed.
If the article is not enough for you...
At the beginning of 2015, American journalist Ashley Vance’s book “Elon Musk. Tesla, SpaceX and the road to the future." While working on the book, Vance interviewed Musk's family and friends, former and current employees of Tesla, SpaceX, PayPal and Zip2.
Musk himself at first did not want to help Vance with the work, but then agreed - provided that he could offer his own versions of the events described. Vance refused, but Musk suddenly accepted the reporter's terms and met with him regularly throughout the work on the book. Vance himself believes that Musk was convinced by the journalist’s determination and confidence in how to work.
There are many funny moments in the book - for example, Musk said that his family was afraid that representatives of the Russian space industry would hire killers to eliminate a competitor.
2018 has already become the worst year in history. The electric car manufacturer still cannot reach its stated production capacity, quarterly losses are growing at a record pace, its reputation is coming apart at the seams, investors are indignant, and Musk’s eccentric behavior is only adding fuel to the fire. Now shareholders and a British diver are trying to sue him, and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is sniffing around for financial manipulation. The main innovator of our time seriously risks falling under civil and even criminal prosecution. How Elon Musk is dragging his own company to the bottom - in the material.
The tweets are spinning - the laveha is muddled
In early August, the news instantly spread across the Internet that Musk was going to take all Tesla shares and turn it into a private company. The entrepreneur easily and naturally announced this on his Twitter, adding that “financing has been secured.” According to Musk, he was willing to pay $420 for each Tesla share, which exceeded the current market supply at that time by about 15 percent. The statement by the head of the company instantly provoked a stir in the securities market, as those who wanted to make extra money on the price difference rushed to buy Tesla shares, as a result of which the quotes increased by seven percent.
A little later that day, the head of Tesla heated up the situation by saying that he would not sell his stake and, to be sure, he repeated his offer once again. As a result, NASDAQ was even forced to suspend trading in Tesla shares for some time, and at the time of their closure, the company’s stock quotes added a total of 11 percent. It is estimated that Musk earned $1.4 billion from a couple of Twitter posts. True, after a few days those who, on the contrary, lost money, showed up.
“Short traders,” or Tesla shareholders who are short-sellers, lost more than a billion dollars on Musk’s scandalous tweet. Some of them united to go to court. The plaintiffs claim that the Tesla CEO violated securities laws and that his claim that he had secured financing for the company's delisting was false. In other words, dissatisfied shareholders are confident that Musk had one single goal: to push the stock up. However, the actions of the head of the company were not liked not only by investors who “short” Tesla shares - but also by the US Securities and Exchange Commission.
Deftly jumped off
Musk explained his initiative by saying that turning into a private company would help the successful development of Tesla. He noted that being a public company is likely to harm its promotion, in particular due to the need to publish quarterly financial reports and stock price fluctuations. However, as always, the entrepreneur’s loud statements resulted in almost a week of silence. On August 13, Musk released an update, saying that the company was ready to be bought by the Saudi Arabian Sovereign Wealth Fund (PIF), which already has a five percent stake. Thus, he confirmed the information of sources who had previously reported about Riyadh’s interest in Tesla.
True, already on August 17, in an interview, Musk said that he was wishful thinking. According to sources, negotiations with representatives of the fund gave the businessman confidence in supporting the initiative, but the Saudis ultimately did not confirm their interest in privatizing Tesla. At the same time, there are rumors in the media that PIF is negotiating with a competitor American company- the Chinese startup Lucid Motors, and the buyout of Tesla could be financed by Space X. However, where Musk’s other company got $66 billion from - that much would be required for the buyout without taking into account the package of the CEO of the company - was not specified.
A few days later, Musk announced that everything would remain as it is - Tesla would not be private. “Based on the feedback I have received, it is clear that the majority of current Tesla shareholders believe that we are better off remaining a public company,” the electric vehicle maker said in a statement posted on its official blog. Musk said he knew the process of becoming a fully private company would be difficult, but after consulting, he realized it would be “even more time-consuming and confusing.”
And nothing has changed
In addition to new proceedings, the company's old problems are also making themselves known - namely, its unprofitability and difficulties in production. Having abandoned the idea of taking Tesla private, Musk acknowledged that going public would prevent increased production of the Model 3 electric vehicle, which remains a priority today. Tesla has crept up to the Model 3 production volume of five thousand cars per week six months later than the promised date - as of August 31, 4,588 electric vehicles roll off the assembly line every week. Musk promised to achieve this level of production at the end of 2017. Moreover, following the results of the second quarter of 2018, he announced plans to reach the production level of six thousand Model 3s per week by the end of August - and again words are wasted.
In early August, the company reported financial results for April-June 2018. And although Tesla's total revenue rose to four billion dollars from 2.79 billion a year earlier and outpaced analysts' expectations of 3.29 billion, the company's losses also increased. Net loss for the second quarter was $717.5 million, down from $336.4 million in the same period in 2017. But Elon Musk still assured investors that by the end of 2018 the company would achieve sustainable profits and begin to repay debts. He also apologized to analysts for their previous conversation: then Musk answered “stupid” questions and said that he was bored. And Bloomberg praised the businessman, writing that he behaves like a “real CEO,” but Musk’s promises are hard to believe.
Dude, you are very strange
Financial and production problems are compounded by the extravagant behavior of the head of the company. Lately, Musk has been plagued by scandals and has already gained fame as an odious figure. Now he is being sued not only by Tesla shareholders, but also by a British diver who rescued Thai children from a flooded cave, whom the billionaire is unprovenly a “pedophile.” This reaction from the entrepreneur was caused by the fact that diver Vern Unsworth criticized a mini-submarine that Space X engineers assembled specifically for the rescue operation. According to Unsworth, the submarine, which was nothing more than a PR stunt, had no chance of reaching the children trapped in the cave. As a result, he concluded that Musk could shove this submarine far away. The businessman himself, as the main shareholder, lost almost $300 million after a showdown on Twitter. He also got into a verbal altercation with a couple of other followers. One of them said that Musk is siphoning money from all over the world for the sake of his projects. To this, the engineer replied that, unlike the author of the question, he had created jobs for 300 thousand people, and was curious about what the subscriber could boast of.
On his Twitter, the entrepreneur spoke about Tesla's bankruptcy due to the sale easter eggs, then because of a stolen drawing of a unicorn. In terms of the degree of eccentric behavior on social networks, the head of Tesla can easily compete with the President of the United States. They are especially related to their quarrelsome relationship with funds. mass media. For example, in July, Musk launched a campaign against Business Insider journalist Lynette Lopez, according to whom Tesla writes off about 40 percent of raw materials as scrap metal, and the Model 3 has defective batteries. Previously an engineer
Canadian-American science fiction writer William Gibson, considered the founder of the cyberpunk genre, argues that the future has already arrived, it is just unevenly distributed. This statement comes to mind when you learn about some technological innovation or scientific breakthrough in the course of another study.
No less interesting are the people behind these projects - John McAfee, Elon Musk and others. Based on the biography of each of them, you can make a film that will give odds to any artistic invention. A film about Elon Musk would be especially interesting.
Childhood and youth
The future inventor, entrepreneur and billionaire was born on June 28, 1971. This happened in Pretoria, the administrative capital of the Republic of South Africa. Elon was the first child in the family of South African entrepreneur Errol Musk and his wife, Canadian model Maye Musk (nee Haldman). Later, Elon had a sister, Tosca, who became a television director, and a brother, Kimbal, a future entrepreneur and venture capitalist.
At an early age, Elon was a very reserved boy - he preferred reading books to playing with other children. Errol noted that his eldest son grew up to be a very inquisitive child, whose way of thinking was strikingly different from the way of thinking of his peers. Elon was four years old when he asked his parents where the world began and ended.
Errol and May divorced in 1979. By agreement of the parties, the children remained to live with their father. At school, Elon often came into conflict with his peers, which once led to serious injuries; the boy had to be urgently hospitalized.
Elon Musk and his brother Kimbal For his tenth birthday, Elon received an eight-bit computer as a gift from his father. Personal Computer"Commodore VIC-20". The boy liked the gift and immediately became interested in programming. Two years later, the future entrepreneur sold the game he developed, “Blastar,” for $500. Later, this money went to Elon's first serious investment, invested in a pharmaceutical company, which Musk followed through the media. By the time he graduated from school, Elon already had a substantial amount in his account.
After finishing school, Elon and Kimbal moved to Canada to live with their mother. There, Elon entered a local university - Queen's University in Kingston (Ontario). The next university the guy attended was the University of Pennsylvania.
While studying in Pennsylvania, Elon and his friend Adeo Ressi rented a ten-room house in which the guys threw huge parties, which is why they were on the verge of expulsion from the university several times. However, Elon managed to graduate from university, receiving a bachelor's degree in physics and economics. After this, he decides to continue his studies at the private Stanford University, but gives up this idea, deciding to implement a startup developed jointly with his brother.
Carier start
Elon's first project is "Zip2", the idea of which came to Elon and his brother Kimbal during conversations in 1996. Having borrowed a certain amount of money from their father, the guys began work. Zip2 developed software for news companies. The company's clients included The New York Times and Pulitzer Publishing.
Three years later the company was sold to PC manufacturer Compaq Computer Corporation. However, proposals have been received before. Elon had great difficulty convincing his colleagues that the startup had not yet fully revealed its potential, and that later the company could be sold more profitably.
And so it happened: in 1999, “Zip2” was sold for 308 million dollars, of which Elon himself got 22 million. The bulk of the proceeds went to finance the new project, and with the remaining money Musk purchased a McLaren F1 sports car. Elon's further biography is closely intertwined with his projects.
"PayPal"
After the sale of Zip2, Elon launched the X.com project. In 2000, Musk met Peter Thiel (during a car race with whom Elon crashes his McLaren F1), whose company Confinity was already developing a similar project called PayPal. It was decided to carry out a merger in order to jointly resolve the issue of creating a full-fledged electronic money system.
During his work, disputes often arose between Elon and the board of directors. The main dispute concerned the name: Musk wanted the project to be called "X.com", while others preferred the option "PayPal".
The situation was resolved unexpectedly: during Elon’s flight to Australia, an urgent meeting of the board of directors was convened, as a result of which Musk was fired and his duties were transferred to Peter Thiel. The decision was unfair, because it was Elon’s ideas that led to the rapid growth of the enterprise.
In October 2002, PayPal was sold to the world's largest online auction site, eBay, for one and a half billion dollars. Musk earned $175 million from the sale of the debit electronic payment system, $100 million of which was immediately invested in the SpaceX project, and $70 million in Tesla Motors.
In 2010, Elon invested money in the company Stripe, a competitor to PayPal, making it clear to the latter’s management that the insult had not yet been forgotten. By 2017, Stripe was already seriously on its feet - the company managed to acquire a partner in Twitter.
"SpaceX"
According to his family, Elon’s favorite reading material has always been science fiction. This led to the fact that in June 2002, Musk founded his third company, SpaceX. The new project was dedicated to the private development of launch vehicles and spaceships. It is believed that before the founding of SpaceX, Elon tried to buy back the written-off soviet missiles to work on another project, but due to the high asking price, I had to abandon this idea.
In 2006, the first rocket developed and assembled at the SpaceX factories was presented. It was the Falcon 1 rocket, which received its name in honor of Han Solo’s Millennium Falcon, the spaceship from “ Star Wars" With the help of Falcon 1, it was possible to launch Malaysia's space satellite into orbit.
In December 2008, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) signed a contract with the company to launch SpaceX launch vehicles and spacecraft to the International Space Station. The contract amount was $1.6 billion - this saved Musk from bankruptcy, which he was on the verge of due to the global financial crisis of 2008.
In January 2016, SpaceX management announced plans to implement a flight to Mars by 2020-2025.
Recent SpaceX projects include a spacesuit developed by the company, a photo of which Elon posted on his Instagram on August 23, 2017. The design of the protective suit refers to cult science-fiction films such as “2001: A Space Odyssey”, “Alien” and “Star Trek”. Musk admitted that it was not easy to strike a balance between functionality and aesthetics. appearance spacesuit.
"Tesla"
Tesla was founded in 2003, and its founders are Mark Tampenning and Martin Eberhard. Elon Musk is not the actual founder of the company, but it was he who became the ideological inspirer of Tesla and the first serious investor ($70 million, proceeds from the sale of PayPal shares). After such a generous donation, the company was noticed by the founders of Google and Larry Page, eBay founder Jeffrey Skoll, as well as the management of Toyota and Daimler AG.
Tesla was engaged in the development and production of environmentally friendly electric vehicles, for which it became the laureate of “The Crunchies” in the “Best Environmental Initiative 2007” category.
The company's first product, the Tesla Roadster, went on sale in 2008.
On July 28, 2017, at the Tesla factory in Fremont, California, the first 30 customers who pre-ordered the Tesla Model 3 received the keys to the company's new electric vehicles.
Personal life
Musk first married in 2000 to the girl Justine (Justine), with whom he studied at Queen's University. Later, Justine became a popular Canadian writer and gave birth to six sons to Ilona: Nevada Alexander, Xavier, Saxon, Griffin, Damien and Kai. In 2008, the couple separated.
Almost immediately, Elon was seen in the company of an English actress. In 2010, Elon and Talulah got married, and in 2012 they separated, only to get married again in 2013. The remarriage lasted until 2016.
On April 23, 2017, it became known about Musk’s new girlfriend, she became ex-wife, Hollywood actress (“Alpha Dog”, “Never Back Down”, “Welcome to Zombieland”, “Justice League”).
Elon's life is eventful. In December 2016, he became a member of the President's Forum on Strategy and Policy, consisting of 16 American entrepreneurs. The organization's mission is to advise the President of the United States on the creation of new jobs, increasing labor productivity, as well as on issues related to economic growth states.
In the same year, Elon’s new company, Neuralink, was founded. IN short term The company will develop devices for the treatment of complex brain diseases. There are also plans to begin improving people through the introduction of implantable brain-computer interfaces.
In addition, Musk is busy with other projects, including new developments by SolarCity, the company of his cousins Peter and Lyndon Ryve, as well as experimental launches of the Hyperloop high-speed train.
On October 7, 2017, the governor of Puerto Rico announced on Twitter that Elon Musk had volunteered to help restore power to the island damaged by Hurricane Maria.
By the way, Elon himself also managed to become the hero of a book written by a writer and journalist named Ashley Vance.
Condition assessment
In 2015, unofficial data appeared on the Internet, according to which Elon Musk’s fortune was $13.1 billion.
The following year, official information appeared, provided by Forbes. According to information from the American financial and economic magazine, Musk owns an amount equal to $10.7 billion.
Quotes
- About the Third World War: “China. Russia. Soon all countries will be strong in computer science. National competition for artificial intelligence supremacy will likely trigger World War III."
- On the Matrix: “We have to hope that we are all living in a simulator.”
- About the virtual universe: “Either we create simulators indistinguishable from reality, or civilization will cease to exist.”
The article is dedicated to the founder of the company, about whom we most often write. The name of this company is Tesla Motors, and the name of its founder is Elon Musk.
Many automotive publications that write about Tesla electric vehicles mistranslate Musk. You noticed that we always write “Elon” on the site, while most people read and write it as “Elon.” But let’s skip these details, even if they are quite significant. Let's move on to a description of the life of this outstanding man.
Elon Musk was born on June 28, 1971 in Republic of South Africa, in the administrative capital - Pretoria.
Elon Musk is known throughout the world not only for his participation in the founding of Tesla Motors. Previously, this man founded a company whose services are used by almost the whole world. This company is the world's largest electronic payment operator - Paypal.
Tesla Motors is not Elon Musk's only technology company. Another large company is SpaceX, founded in 2002.
Elon Musk's ideas and ambitions win the hearts of many people. He is often compared to Steve Jobs, but the goals of these figures are very different, and Elon is far from a master of public speaking. But his ideas are much more useful to society. Let us quote as an example what Garrett Reisman said about SpaceX:
The company was founded to promote human space exploration. This is the main reason for our existence.
Elon Musk's childhood
As we already wrote, the future founder of Tesla Motors grew up in one of the capitals of the Republic of South Africa. Wikipedia that Musk was already teaching himself how to program at the age of 10, and at the age of 12 he earned $500 from selling his game Blastar.
When he turned 17, he moved to Canada, and at the age of 19, he moved to the University of Pennsylvania, where he studied business and physics. An unusual combination, isn't it?
At the age of 24, together with his brother Kimbal Musk, he created the company Zip2. After 4 years the company was sold. Before taxes, Elon Musk received $22 million for his 7% stake.
The era of electronic payments
That same year, Musk co-founded X.com, an electronic payments company. In March 2000, X.com acquired Confinity, which created a money transfer system called PayPal. PayPal was only a month old at the time of purchase. Believing in PayPal's success, Elon Musk began transforming X.com into PayPal. In 2002, PayPal was sold to the online auction site Ebay. From the sale, the future founder of Tesla Motors received $165 million.
SpaceX Company
With the funds received from the sale of PayPal, Elon Musk founded the company, which to this day exists and wins tenders from NASA. The company's field of activity is the creation of launch vehicles for transporting both cargo and astronauts. Because The last shuttle launch was carried out in 2011, there are prospects that SpaceX will become the main transport for transporting astronauts. There is also the option of using Russian Soyuz, but with the political crisis, Soyuz is probably not the solution.
The innovation, so to speak, of SpaceX rockets is that they are reusable. Now rockets are used only once, after which another rocket is needed to launch again. The approach used by SpaceX significantly reduces the cost of launches into space, which makes the company also a contender for cheap commercial launches of people into space. Elon Musk is also competing with Richard Branson and his Virgin Galaxy.
Behind the SpaceX company is the idea of the need to populate other planets and the development of humanity in the field of space exploration and exploration. Undoubtedly, a noble and more than adequate idea.
Don’t miss important information about SpaceX – the site publishes it in a special section.
Tesla Motors Company
Finally, we have reached the one of Elon Musk’s companies that we write about most often on the site. Tesla Motors was founded a year after the creation of SpaceX, in 2003.
The scope of activity of this company is the creation of environmentally friendly electric vehicles. A completely sensible idea, given that oil reserves are still running out, and the air in populated areas is becoming increasingly polluted.
Tesla Motors introduced the first car available for sale in 2008. We know this electric car called Tesla Roadster. And although the car was not greeted with enthusiasm by the world as much as we would like, in particular you can remember that Elon Musk and his company worked hard on more advanced electric cars and in 2011 the Tesla Model S was presented to the world. And it is something. You can read more about the electric car here -.
At the end of 2014, Tesla Motors will present a new interesting electric crossover car.
The creation of a budget electric car is also expected in 2015.
You can read more about the company’s activities and its achievements in the article.
Elon Reeve Musk is a Canadian-American billionaire, inventor and philanthropist. Born on June 28, 1971 in South Africa, he later moved to Canada and then to the USA.
This is the perfect embodiment of the seemingly long-lost American dream: arriving in the United States with a few dollars in his pocket, he became a billionaire.
Received higher education and a bachelor's degree in physics and economics.
He made his fortune by creating and developing many innovative companies (X.com, PayPal, SpaceX, Tesla Motors, etc.). He is engaged in active business and philanthropic activities, maintains a political lobby in the US Congress, reads a lot, and acts in feature films (“ iron Man 2”, “Machete Kills”, etc.).
He became the prototype for the character Tony Stark in the film Iron Man. Married twice, has five sons from his first marriage. Esquire magazine included Musk in its list of the 75 most influential people of the 21st century.
From the editor: an amazing person. While preparing his biography, we encountered many conflicting opinions: for some, he is a genius, for others, a PR man who devours budget money. Doesn't leave you indifferent. A dreamer who makes bold and, for most, impossible dreams come true. Amazing man.
Main achievements
Elon Musk is best known as a successful businessman and innovator. Almost all of his projects are highly profitable and have brought him significant income and wide popularity.
His first company was Zip2, which he founded with his brother with money from his father ($20 thousand). The company was developing the Internet for the media industry, entered into contracts with the popular newspapers The New York Times and the Chicago Tribune, and after 4 years it was sold for a huge amount of about 350 million dollars, from which Musk received about 22 million.
Literally a month later, Musk became a co-founder of the online payment company X.COM. A year later, his company merges with Confinity and takes the name PayPal. In 2002, the company will be sold at a price of one and a half billion dollars, and Musk's share was about 170 million dollars.
There is a legend that after the sale of PayPal, Musk came to Russia in order to finance the creation of a private space company based on Russian developments. But not a single official considered his idea serious. Tests in Moscow for several days, he bought several books by Tsialkovsky and decided that he could create a rocket on his own. The principles are known. I don’t know if this legend is true, but...
In 2001, Musk entered the space industry with the concept of an “Oasis on Mars,” a settlement on Mars that would grow food on the “Red Planet” and provide for its own needs. According to him, this was done in order to attract public attention to the study of outer space.
In 2002, he founded the company Space Exploration Technologies or Space X, investing one hundred million dollars in it. The company was engaged in the development and production of rocket launch vehicles, and for seven years developed the Falcon family of rocket launch vehicles, creating the Dragon spacecraft.
In September 2009, the Falcon 1 rocket became the first private launch vehicle to launch a satellite into Earth orbit. In 2006, Space X signed a $1.6 billion contract with NASA and also received significant government orders.
In 2011, Musk said he hoped to send people to colonize Mars in 10-20 years and create the first colony there.
In 2004, Musk also invested in Tesla Motors, which develops and produces electric vehicles. The businessman joined the board of directors, becoming chairman of the board. He took an active part in the development of the company’s product, the Roaster sports car, which gained wide popularity, and Musk himself was awarded the prestigious “Global Green” green award for the development of an environmentally friendly car.
Musk's financial flexibility and perseverance, and his subsequent investments in the project, allowed the company to survive the financial crisis of 2008, while expanding the company's lineup with new successful models (Model S, Model X, etc.). The company's profits are growing day by day, amounting to many tens of millions of dollars a year.
Musk also invested in the SolarCity company (the production of private power plants for households and organizations), and also invested in the Hyperloop project, which, according to his plan, could become the basis for the transport system of the future. Hyperloop will allow passenger capsules to reach speeds of more than a thousand kilometers per hour, over a distance of up to one and a half thousand kilometers.
Secrets of Elon Musk's success
Musk believes that the reason for his success is his critical mind, escape from stereotypes and stereotypes of thinking, endless enthusiasm and energy. “I have always been critical of what my parents told me. Never took them at their word and always asked “why?” Then I tried to understand the meaning and logic of their answer."
Also, according to the entrepreneur, you need to be completely immersed in the business, without any distractions. Only complete dedication, seven days a week without breaks, complete concentration on the task - it is this kind of perfectionism that is one of the roots of personal success.
Musk sees the main obstacle to innovation in people’s tendency to make analogies. Therefore, instead of doing something qualitatively new, people try to improve the old. The businessman calls for throwing away all restrictions and stereotypes, and starting to build concepts and projects from scratch, from the very basics. This is the only way to create exceptional and first-class things.
Opinion: The secret of Musk’s success lies in the material and technical base of the United States and in the enormous resources that the government provides him. There are no miracles. Innovation is very expensive. We need personnel, not only engineers, but also managers, lawyers, and financiers. Look at attempts in other countries to create innovative products, for example electric cars: where there is no base, this idea fails.
Quotes from Elon Musk
- I would like to die with the thought that humanity has a bright future
- I think that people today are somehow too carried away with all the Internet, finance and law. This is one of the reasons why we have little innovation.
- Maybe I read too many comics as a kid. They're always trying to save the world. Everything there looked like everyone should try to improve this world; it simply couldn’t be any other way.
- The only thing that should be done is to contribute to the general enlightenment of mankind.
- I do like computer games, but if I create the coolest games, how will this affect earthly affairs, the world as a whole?
- I like to bring to life technologies that I believe are important for the future and bring some benefit.
- While we are throwing away rockets and ships, we are not truly mastering space.
- I'm like a samurai - I'd rather die than give up.
Elon Musk's ideas and goals
Musk sets global goals: he wants to save the human race from voluntary or accidental destruction.
The idea of making humanity an interplanetary species originated with Musk a long time ago. And first of all, we are talking about the settlement of Mars. At the SpaceX headquarters, at the entrance hangs an inspiring picture with two states of Mars - current and planned:
And if you pay attention, all of his current projects are subordinated to this goal. To get to Mars, you need to make space flights an order of magnitude cheaper than they cost now - this is being successfully implemented by SpaceX. There is no suitable fuel on Mars, so electric cars that will be charged from solar panels will be useful there (and there are already hundreds of such stations where any owner of a Tesla car can charge his car for free throughout the United States).
And this isn't a waste of money - all three companies are profitable, commercially successful and at the cutting edge of technology.
