Elon Musk is an engineer, inventor, entrepreneur and investor. Co-founder of PayPal and SpaceX. Chairman of the Board of Directors, CEO and the main ideological inspirer of the world famous company Tesla.
For outstanding services to science on May 9, 2018, Elon Musk was awarded membership of the Royal Society of London.
According to Forbes magazine, as of 2017, his capital exceeds $21 billion.
Biography of Elon Musk
Elon Reeve Musk was born on June 28, 1971 in Pretoria (capital). His father, Eroll, was an engineer. Mother, May, worked as a nutritionist and model.
Interestingly, Ilon's parents grew up in the same yard, so they knew each other well. In addition to Elon, another boy and one girl were born in the Musk family.
Childhood and youth
With early years the future inventor was a very reserved and taciturn child. By the way, the great physicist was just as unsociable in his youth.
Elon spent whole days reading, having managed to read two sets of encyclopedias.
An interesting fact is that Musk has a photographic ability, which allows him to hold and reproduce in detail the image of an object or phenomenon.
However, the more he learned, the more it irritated his peers. At school, Elon was constantly mocked and repeatedly beaten, and once even had his nose broken.
Elon Musk and his brother Kimbal When Musk was 8 years old, his parents divorced, leaving the children to live with their father. The head of the family was a very tough and demanding person.
He often took both sons with him to work, who had to work at a construction site. As a result, they gained many useful skills.
When Elon reached the age of ten, his father gave him a computer. Soon he managed to master the programming language, and even create his own video game. Subsequently, he will sell it for $500.
Interestingly, Musk did not spend his earnings on any entertainment or acquisitions typical of his age.
Instead, he began to invest the funds received in one pharmaceutical company, noticing its promising growth.
Soon, Elon Musk was able to get a substantial amount from the sale of shares. As a result, he and his brother decide to leave for, despite the prohibition of his father.
Education
After settling with his relatives, Elon enters the Queen's University in Kingston. Then he continues his studies at the University of Pennsylvania. His student years turned out to be much more fun than his school years.
Musk made many friends with whom he often organized parties. For such a lifestyle, he was almost expelled from educational institution. However, he still managed to graduate and become a bachelor in physics and economics.
Musk's early career
The first company in the career of Musk and his brother was Zip2, founded in 1996. They borrowed money for start-up capital from their father.
Zip2 was developing software for news companies. In less than 3 years, the brothers will sell it for $308 million.
As a result of the sale, Elon received $ 22 million, and invested the bulk of the funds in a new project. With the rest of the money, he bought a McLaren F1 sports car.
This was only the beginning of successful endeavors in his biography.
PayPal
In 2000, Elon met Peter Thiel. Together with him, he decides to create an electronic money system that could be used all over the world. Soon the project was successfully launched.
Peter Thiel and Elon Musk at PayPal After some time, the founders were faced with the question of which brand to choose for the emerging payments giant: X.com or PayPal.
As a result, a conflict arose, since Elon Musk categorically advocated the X.com brand. Ultimately, by decision of the board of directors, Musk was fired from the company. At the same time, some considered such a decision unfair, since many of the ideas that contributed to the development of the company belonged to Elon.
In 2002, eBay bought PayPal for $1.5 billion. On this sale, Musk, who has an 11.7% stake, earned $ 180 million. He invested almost all of this amount in his SpaceX and Tesla Motors projects.
SpaceX
Since childhood, Elon has been reading science fiction. Perhaps for this reason, in 2002, he created a large company called SpaceX, which was engaged in the manufacture of launch vehicles and spacecraft.
After 6 years, NASA entered into an agreement with SpaceX in excess of one and a half billion dollars.
In 2016, Ilona's company announced that it plans to fly to in the near future. According to their calculations, this should happen before 2025.
Tesla
In 2003, big events took place in the biography of Elon Musk. He became the inspirer and leader of the Tesla company, and also invested about $70 million in it.
Tesla continues to successfully produce electricity-powered vehicles today.
Personal life
The first wife of Elon Musk was Justine, whom he met in his student years. The couple got married in 2000. They had six boys, but after 8 years of marriage, they decided to leave.
The second wife in Musk's biography was actress Talulah Riley. This union lasted 6 years, after which the couple divorced in 2016.
A year later, the inventor married for the third time. His chosen one was the actress Amber Heard. It is curious to note that before that the girl was married to.
In 2018, Musk appeared in public with Canadian singer Grimes, which caused rumors about his new romance. However, there is no reliable information about this.
By his own admission Elon Musk, he has trouble sleeping and uses sleeping pills.
According to The New York Times, some members of the Tesla board of directors expressed their concern about this.
Smoking Elon Musk
In September 2018, Musk attended the American comedian Joe Rogan show. During the conversation, Rogan invited him to smoke a mixture of marijuana and tobacco live on the air.
The Tesla founder agreed, after asking the comedian if it was legal.
Elon Musk smokes live Musk also said that he rarely smokes marijuana, explaining that the drug has no effect on him.
After this broadcast, the next day, Tesla shares fell by 10%, and the smoking Elon Musk became real on the Internet.
Elon Musk today
To this day, Elon Musk is still in the spotlight. At the end of 2016, he joined the Presidential Forum on Strategy and Policy.
The purpose of this organization is to advise the President on issues related to the creation of new jobs and economic development countries.
In the same year, Elon Musk founded another company called Neuralink. She is engaged in the study and invention of devices aimed at treatment.
On October 7, 2017, Musk helped restore power to a devastated Puerto Rico.
Today, as before, Elon Musk devotes a lot of free time to reading. In addition, he likes extreme views. He is often written about in the press and shown on television.
Perhaps in the future he will be able to surprise humanity more than once with his fantastic inventions and personal achievements.
Photo by Elon Musk
Below are the most famous and popular photo Elon Musk. There will also be a photo with his mother, who, despite her advanced age, retains an amazing appearance. All photos of Elon Musk are taken from open sources.
Elon Musk with his father (far left) and brother (center) 
Ilona has a very stylish and beautiful mother. At 68 years old, Maye Musk is involved in advertising campaigns for leading brands as a model and fashion icon. 
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Elon Reeve Musk (born June 28, 1971, Pretoria, South Africa) is an American entrepreneur, inventor, co-founder of PayPal, founder and CEO of SpaceX and Tesla, member of the Board of Directors of SolarCity.
His personal fortune, according to Forbes, is $20 billion (as of March 2018).
In the Forbes lists for the 2017 businessman:
- #12 among tech billionaires
- No. 21 in the list of "The most influential people on the planet"
- No. 30 among " richest people USA".
Elon Musk takes on the development of global industries for mankind: solar energy, automobile and rocket science. Over the past decade, he has made the greatest contribution to these industries. Tesla's Model S electric car accelerates to 96 km/h in 2.28 seconds, and SpaceX's used Falcon booster stages successfully return to Earth and are ready for reuse.
For his contribution to the commercialization of space, Elon Musk was awarded the Heinlein Prize and received $ 0.5 million (2011). He was named "Businessman of the Year" by Fortune (2013) and "CEO of the Year" by The Wall Street Journal (2013).
The main goal of Elon Musk is space exploration and the colonization of Mars. In this he sees the salvation of mankind
How did a guy who was born in South Africa in the family of an engineer manage to make a fortune for the realization of his fantastic ideas? What turned yesterday's student into a successful innovator billionaire? The biography of Elon Musk will tell about this.
Childhood and family
Parents
The future inventor was born on June 28, 1971 in the capital of South Africa, Pretoria. Elon was the first child of the Musk couple, the eldest of three children.
Musk's mother, (born 1948), was a Canadian-British model and nutritionist. Mei studied well, loved science; studied at the age of 15 model school and entered the final of the Miss South Africa pageant. Her portfolio is replenished, Mei is now invited to photo shoots by glossy publications.
Father Mask, Errol Musk, worked as an engineer at large construction sites and earned good money.
Musk's parents lived on the same block and first met when May was 11. Errol became May's constant fan: "He fell in love with my legs and teeth," she comments. Meeting periodically while studying at the university, the couple legalized the relationship in 1970. 9 months after the marriage, Elon was born, then the Masks had a boy Kimbal (1972) and a girl Tosca (1974).
The family lived in one of the largest mansions in Pretoria and led the lifestyle of wealthy whites whose wishes were fulfilled by black servants.
Little Elon was teased because of the non-standard name, the boy was named after his maternal great-grandfather John Elon Haldeman. Elon believes that he inherited the ability to take risks from his grandfather, the son of John Haldeman. Grandfather Joshua Haldeman (1902-1974) was an extraordinary man. With his wife and children, he traveled in a 1-engine plane across Canada and North America, and in 1954 wound 48,000 km on a flight to Australia and back! Haldeman was simply obsessed with exploration and adventure, he died when the plane landed.
Elon as a child
Elon grew up as a curious and gifted boy. Sometimes he "withdrew into himself", and did not hear when they spoke to him. Parents were worried - is he developing deafness? But the condition of the child was not connected with hearing, but with the peculiarity of the functioning of the brain: Elon could mentally represent pictures with great detail.
In 2010, Tesla became the first US auto company since 1956 to go public.
In 2012, a network of Supercharger electric filling stations was launched for long-distance travel. Supercharging stations use solar energy and provide "zero" travel costs for Tesla owners.
In 2014, the Tesla Model S “ran” a distance of 5,500 km from Los Angeles to New York in 76 hours, recharging only at branded “gas stations”. Mileage is listed in the Guinness Book of Records for the time spent by an electric car on recharging.
Tesla is expanding the number of "gigafactories" (Gigafactory) - factories for the production of batteries for electric vehicles. Elon Musk claims that about 100 gigafactories will be required to provide the energy potential of the entire planet.
In the Russian edition of the life story of I. Musk “Tesla, SpaceX and the Road to the Future”, the head of the Department of Entrepreneurial Leadership A. Komissarov, in the preface, is amazed at the capabilities of the Tesla Model S: “How could a person with zero experience in the automotive industry be able to create a perfect car?”.
To understand what this car is like, look at the reaction of people who have driven it for the first time in their lives. In the video, acceleration to hundreds in 3 seconds, latest models accelerate in 2 seconds and this is not the limit, very soon the updated Tesla will accelerate in 1.9 seconds:
Video: The reaction of people who first got into the Tesla
SolarCity: The sun will rise tomorrow
SolarCity (2006) is an energy company engaged in the development and installation of solar energy systems, a subsidiary of Tesla, which bought it in 2016. Founded by Peter Rive and his younger brother Lyndon, who are cousins Elon Musk (sons of his mother's sister).
The idea to launch a project in the field of solar energy belongs to Elon Musk, who is the chairman of the Board of Directors.
The company installs solar power plants for private households and enterprises, installs charging stations for electric vehicles.
Elon Musk's projects: vacuum train, drilling company, neural interfaces
hyperloop– project of high-speed pipeline passenger transport. To move the capsule along the tunnel, from which the air is partially pumped out, it is supposed to use mainly "green" energy: wind and the sun. The capsule is expected to reach a speed that is 2 times the speed of the aircraft.
Elon Musk has been involved in the project since 2015, SpaceX and Tesla jointly released a capsule that accelerated to 355 km/h during testing. Other companies are also participating in this project, for example, Virgin Hyperloop One, where the investor is also involved in the design of high-speed transport.
In the summer of 2017, Musk received permission from the US government to open the construction of a hyper-tunnel between New York and Washington D.C. The distance of 250 km is planned to be overcome in less than 30 minutes.
The Boring Company(2016) is another transport project of a businessman. The infrastructure and tunneling drilling company plans to tunnel both for cars on platforms and for the Hyperloop vacuum train.
Neuralink(2016) is a neurotechnological company developing brain-computer implantable interfaces. Research in the field of neurointerfaces (i.e., the connection between a computer and the human brain) is important in the treatment of brain diseases.
Open AI(2015) is a non-profit artificial intelligence (AI) research organization where Musk is a co-founder. The company's activity is not to ban the development of AI, but is aimed at controlling this area. The project is aimed at the availability of the results of the work of scientists, due to which it is planned to avoid the appearance of malicious AI. Elon is predisposed to dark scenarios for the development of AI: he fears that machines can gain power over people. Elon stepped down from the Board of Directors in 2018, but plans to provide financial and advisory support to OpenAI.
Entrepreneur founded a charitable organization foundation Musk Foundation(2002). In 2015, the CF donated $10 million to the Oxford Future of Humanity Institute for research into AI control. Musk also financially helps with the aftermath of the hurricane in Alabama, the tsunami in Soma (Japan).
Elon Musk's personal life: three weddings, two wives, five children
Elon Musk and Justin have a baby (Nevada Alexander) in May 2002, but 10 weeks later the baby dies from "sudden infant death syndrome". In 2004, they again make an attempt to become parents, thanks to the IVF method, the twins Griffin and Xavier are born. In 2006, the family was replenished again: the IVF procedure brings the birth of triplets: Damian, Saxon, Kai.
Justin admits that Elon "always lacked something." When she objected to his demands: “I’m your wife, not an employee,” Elon replied: “If you were my employee, I would fire you.” The couple divorced in 2008, the wife became the initiator of the separation. She calls her married life with Musk “unreal”: celebrity parties, a huge mansion with servants. But the ex-wife recalls the emptiness inside: even while at home, Elon’s thoughts “wandered” elsewhere. She called herself "starter wife" Ilona (starter wife).
The reason for their divorce is sometimes called Elon's passion for the British actress Talulah Riley, but the billionaire himself denies this. The decision to divorce, according to him, was ripe before he met Talulah. At the first meeting in 2008, the girl seemed to Ilon one of "the kindest and gentlest people."
Elon and Justin continue to raise their sons together, Musk spends 4 days a week with children.
Elon is active life position: if he doesn't like something, he creates a product that suits him. He did the same with the education of his children. Musk believes that education should develop individual abilities and "did not see that regular schools are capable of doing this." In 2014 he founded the experimental school "Ad Astra" (lat. "to the stars"). Most of the students' parents work for SpaceX, the school is quite closed (no website on the Internet).
The Western world rests on active, lively, smart, a little adventurous people who create their own business. And even if there were hundreds of losers for one successful businessman, it was they who became the engine and brand of the West. And one of them was Elon Musk.
Childhood
The biography of Elon Musk is very similar to similar stories about the life of the same businessmen, politicians, famous actors and scientists. And often all these professions were combined in the same people. Musk is not a Native American - he was born in Pretoria (South Africa) in the early seventies. The city where Elon Musk was born was formed as the administrative capital of the country, which was also considered a scientific center. His parents worked there - his father (an engineer by profession) and his mother - a Canadian model in his youth, and then a nutritionist. In the family, in addition to Elon, two more children grew up.
At the age of ten, Elon was given the first computer, which allowed him to actively engage in new technologies. Already at the age of twelve, he managed to realize his first computer game for $500. The teenager invested the proceeds in a pharmaceutical company and after a while earned several times more for the shares. With this money, at the age of 17, Musk moved to Canada. There he will know new life, including learning what poverty is. So, he learned to exist on 1 dollar a day, fortunately, without getting a disease of the alimentary tract.
Formation of the worldview
In his youth, Musk literally devoured philosophical and religious books. But the most significant influence on him was science fiction, for example, the book The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. According to the future businessman, it was then that he decided that it was necessary, first of all, to be able to ask the right questions. And when he got a job in college, he already understood how to influence the development of civilization - he will work on the resettlement of earthlings to new planets. The entrepreneur set himself the task of making fantasy real in order to contribute to the development of the space industry. And I started looking for funds.
First steps in business
In the early nineties, Musk changes his place of residence and stops in the USA, where he gets a job at the University of Pennsylvania and begins to study such opposite subjects as physics and business. He is writing his doctoral dissertation at Stanford University, but he does not attend classes. Together with his friends, students like him, Musk creates the company Zip2. At the end of the twentieth century, this company was bought out by Compaq Computer for $307 million, of which the young man received $20 million. With this money, he acquired a McLaren F1 aircraft and moved to luxury housing.
From X.com to SolarCity
The businessman didn't stay put. Elon Musk, whose biography is full of various, often simply miraculous phenomena, creates a new company at the end of the twentieth century immediately after he sold the previous one. X.com was initially successful, but then problems arose. A couple of years later, the company was renamed PayPal, merging with the latter.
Both structures worked on the development of individual electronic money transfers through the e-mail system, and the result of the commercial transaction was the unification of payment systems. In practice, however, this did not work out. Musk stood firm behind the X.com brand without rebranding it as PayPal. Colleagues thought otherwise. This led to a split in the leadership of the campaign.
The development of events ended with the departure of Musk by decision of the board of directors. But Elon's very idea of forming a new company by merging the two firms, along with the rapid development of the online payment computer system, contributed to the growth of the company's image in record time. The firm had already been irrevocably transformed into PayPal. Significant changes and growth in value made it possible to place securities on the stock exchange in early 2002. In the same year, PayPal was acquired by eBay for $1.5 billion. Given that Musk had an 11.7% stake in the firm, he received $175 million.
New business
In 2006, Musk formed SolarCity, a firm that he still owns and maintains to this day. This organization is working on the creation of compact power plants for individual use on the roofs of buildings. But the guiding principle was not to build power stations for the owners of houses on their own, but to receive them on lease for a long period. The buyer can analyze the commercial benefits from the implementation of such a project, because he buys his individual solar power plant for a very low price. Their owners are usually ordinary Americans. The business turned out to be successful.
But Elon Musk himself was already moving on to other projects.
Happy end american
Here we need to make a short pause. Elon Musk, whose biography has both rapid success and fiasco, turned out to be very lucky when it comes to innovative ideas. AT last years his firm moves more successfully than rivals. With over 30 operations centers across the US, a new customer arrives every five minutes and there is a long queue of those who want to work with solar energy ahead. SolarCity has already installed similar equipment in more than tens of thousands of homes and is now rated as one of the largest.
Hence the serious shifts in the fate of Musk himself. In the list of billionaires of Forbs magazine in 2016, Elon Musk's fortune is estimated at $10.7 billion.
In December of the same year, he was among the members of the Presidential Forum on Strategy and Policy under President Trump, a small group of 16 American businessmen assembled to develop solutions for the 45th US president on economic challenges.
Elon Musk, in his short life, received a large number of awards for what he managed to invent. In 2008, he was included in the list of 75 most significant people of the year according to Esquire magazine. In 2011, the businessman accepts the Heinlein Prize for great achievements in the commercialization of space. At the same time, Forbes included him in the list of the 20 most influential young big businessmen.
Elon Musk was the second entrepreneur to start three firms worth over $1 billion each. After that, a large number of businessmen wanted to reproduce such a success. However, they were in for a fiasco. It seems that the businessman worked according to other laws. Or he was born under the wing of fortune.
Spacewalk
Elon Musk, whose biography shows that in any case you can’t stop, creates a rocket company in 2002. At the same time, it was immediately announced that the main task was to reduce the cost of space flights and the exploration of Mars. Elon Musk (SpaceX is his brainchild) is defined as a private author, manufacturer of a number of launch vehicles and commercial operator of space structures.
And he was again waiting for success. In the same year, NASA entered into a $1.6 billion contract with the company for 12 Falcon 9 rocket launches and spaceship Dragon to the International Space Station to change obsolete carriers.
Such great interest was caused, according to the memoirs of Elon himself, not only by the craving for profit, but also by the ideas of major science fiction writers, in particular, the novels of Isaac Asimov with his ideas of the universal development of the universe. The businessman believed that the expansion of mankind's possessions on several planets would be a good defense against the danger of the elimination of civilization.
So far, SpaceX has made a number of space rockets and the Dragon spacecraft. In 2010, it became the first spacecraft to successfully launch, orbit, and return. Later, in 2015, it was the first spacecraft attached to the ISS.
In 2006, Musk's firm won first place in NASA's competition for grants for space objects and earned $278 million from it. So far, five successful flights have already been carried out.
Tesla
The name of Elon Musk is forever associated with another company - Tesla Motors. In 2010, the shares of the firm, which had never shown normal returns, were put up for public sale. And the moment was so successful that immediately the value of the shares rose by 41%. Forbes dubbed them the most profitable stocks of the year.
In 2012, Musk expressed his belief that in half a century all cars will be electric. He began to work along this line, and in 2008 Elon Musk created the Tesla Roadster after all - this is the first electric car put into mass production.
Business plan
The mask is often compared to Steve Jobs. He used the phrase "reality distortion field", convincing everyone that the impossible is possible. Musk's co-workers claim that he is gathering material in such a way that technology develops within its reality.
His company Tesla Motors was often on the verge of ruin, although Elon Musk himself achieved great results in business. The biography of Tesla, the creator, makes it clear that the businessman tried by all means to keep the company afloat. The situation has improved over the years.
A little about personal
Elon Musk's personal life is not original compared to the rest famous people. The first wife, Justine Musk, studied with Elon at the same university in Canada. Their marriage took place in 2000, they have five sons. But in the fall of 2008, the couple decided to separate, because Musk began dating English actress Taluda Riley. The second marriage took place in 2010 and turned out to be unsuccessful - the couple divorced several times, then converged again, until in 2016 they broke up forever.
Elon Musk is currently dating American actress Amber Heard.
Gotta live differently
Elon Musk, whose biography teaches us to constantly step out of line, believes that innovation is hindered by people's ability to think in analogies. That's why they don't organize fresh ideas but trying to improve what already exists. The businessman believes that it is necessary to expand reality and organize something fundamentally opposite.
By the way, space seems to be unrealistic for business. A lot of money is needed to implement projects in this area. But Musk is convinced that costs can be drastically reduced by defining a new mission for flights. Because of this, he formed SpaceX, whose goal is the colonization of planets. The entrepreneur notes that when it is necessary to relocate the people of the Earth to another planet, it must be done inexpensively.
It's hard to be an innovator
This is the whole Elon Musk. One of the firm's successes is General Motors' decision to develop the Chevy Volt. It is a small machine with electrical charging potential. At the level of an electric car, he is able to drive 65 km. During the period of creation, 33 thousand people wanted to buy a car.
Elon Musk, whose plans are always optimistic, has become successful by implementing seemingly crazy ideas. However, he not only became a self-sufficient person, fed his family, he also went down in history. The businessman seeks to improve life and therefore works on projects that will enable humanity to develop in the coming years.
Childhood
The eldest son in the family.
The younger brother - Kimbal (Kimbal) born in 1972, became a millionaire. Owner of The Kitchen health food restaurant chain. Freeware Creator educational program learning gardens.
Sister Tosca (Tosca) was born in 1974, known as a successful producer, film director, screenwriter, actress.
He spent his childhood and youth in South Africa, the family was wealthy.
He grew up as a closed, uncommunicative and awkward boy, disliking sports activities and ordinary children's entertainment, was known as a typical "nerd", a classic know-it-all. Curiosity and energy were combined in him with some lethargy and the ability to concentrate entirely on solving one problem, shutting himself off from the world. He read comics, science fiction, popular science works, encyclopedias. The second hobby is computers and computer games, programming.
He did not excel his classmates in school subjects - the disciplines studied at school did not arouse his interest. Changed several schools during my studies.
After graduating high school, Elon Musk studied physics and mechanical engineering at the University of Pretoria for 5 months. In 1988, at the age of 17, he left the university and left South Africa to live with his mother's relatives in Montreal, Canada. Partly so as not to serve in the South African army and not participate in the activities of the apartheid regime, but the main thing is to obtain Canadian citizenship and then get to Silicon Valley, emigrate to the United States, which seemed to him a country of endless opportunities for entrepreneurship, ideal for the implementation of his ideas.
Parents
Mother - Maye Musk, Haldeman nee, was born in 1948 in Canada. Canadian-British Model, Practicing Dietitian, Health Expert and proper nutrition, holds a master's degree.
Father - Errol Musk (Errol Graham Musk), Englishman, native of South Africa, born in 1946. Businessman, civil engineer. A person with deep knowledge. By nature, insightful, tough and demanding, at times it was "too much". Strict, one might say - harsh, in matters of raising children. He was quite rich: the approximate level of wealth is at least 20 million US dollars. Apparently, Errol did not want his children to grow up spoiled. In a republic with a racially segregated system, with black workers, servants and the idle life of the white population, this could happen very easily. Became quite wealthy through his own engineering and consulting practice, as well as real estate and infrastructure development related to mining and natural resources. Errol at one time also received a share in the emerald mine (near Lake Tanganyika, Zambia). He owned thoroughbred horses, a yacht, several houses. He was fond of sailing and piloting. Resigned early.
The parents were familiar with adolescence, lived in Pretoria in the same area. In the relationship of parents, and later in the family, the father played a dominant role. Married for 9 years, they divorced in 1980.
Education
In 1989, he entered the university in Canada (Queen's University, Kingston, Ontario). He received a scholarship from the University of Pennsylvania, an Ivy League top 20 university, and moved to the US in 1992 to earn a bachelor's degree in economics and physics. In 1995, Elon came to Stanford (Palo Alto, California) to continue his studies and complete a research and qualification work in applied physics, however, he soon abandoned his studies. Having chosen the Internet, alternative energy and space, he went into entrepreneurial projects.
Family
Was married several times. Has 5 sons. Actively participates in their education.
Elon met Justin Wilson at Kingston University. She subsequently became a writer. They got married in 2000. After 8 years, Elon filed for divorce, and in June 2008, the divorce process was completed. I. Musk considered divorce as another business project and defended the most financially safe result for himself, sought to minimize expenses. And despite the fact that Justine gave birth to Mask 6 sons.
In the period from 2010 to 2016 He was twice married to Talulah Riley, a famous British actress. Story love relationships and parting is not easy. In September 2010, there was the first marriage ceremony, in 2012 - their first divorce. In the summer of 2013 - remarriage. In December 2014, Musk began divorce proceedings, but then withdrew the documents. In March 2016, Talulah filed for divorce, and in October the divorce took place.
Entrepreneurial activity of Elon Musk
In 1995, together with Kimbal Musk, he created Zip2, specializing in writing programs and maintaining websites for newspaper publishing.
X.com, a 1999 startup focused on providing online financial services and direct payment via e-mail, became the next Internet project. A year later, there was a merger with the company-competitor Confinity - the management company of PayPal. By the time EBay acquired PayPal in 2002, Elon Musk owned almost 12% of PayPal shares.
Elon Musk founded Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX, Hawthorne, California) in June 2002 to protect humanity as species and the realization of the dream of mastering Mars, populating a distant planet with people. Company tasks:
- development and production of fully reusable launch vehicles for transporting cargo to the international space station, as well as spacecraft for interplanetary transportation of people;
- increasing the reliability and reducing the cost of human space flights;
- ensure the possibility of human settlement on the red planet.
Since 2003, Elon Musk has been a co-founder of the company, director, designer, chairman of the board of directors of Tesla Motors. In February 2017, Tesla Motors Inc., which produces electric vehicles, announced a name change to Tesla Inc., which is associated with the company's desire to be associated with the production of not only electric vehicles.
Since 2006, Elon Musk has been a co-founder and shareholder of SolarCity, a rooftop solar array that has become the 2nd largest provider of these energy systems in the United States in ten years.
Achievements
He became a millionaire at the age of 28: his first company Zip2 was sold for about 350 million dollars 4 years after its foundation, Musk's share was almost 22 million.
Over the course of seven years, his private space company, backed by government investment, developed the Falcon series of launch vehicles and the multifunctional Dragon spacecraft from the ground up.
Commercial electric vehicles – Tesla Roadster sports car, Tesla Model S sedan and Model X SUV, range extension, production and sale of electric transmission systems – are evidence of undeniable achievements and a significant contribution to the development of environmentally friendly transport.
Billionaire, oh life path and scientific and technical work of which the book “Elon Musk. Tesla, SpaceX and the Road to the Future (2016).
Member of the Presidential Forum on Strategy and Policy, consisting of the sixteen most respected US businessmen, whose function is to advise the President (since December 2016).
- Agreed to donate $1 million to preserve the legacy of Nikola Tesla, organizing the Tesla Science Center at Wardenclyffe Museum.
- In 2011, he donated a $250,000 solar power plant to the tsunami-ravaged city of Soma in Fukushima Prefecture.
- Joined The Giving Pledge charity project with a promise to donate at least half of his capital to charity (2012).
- In 2015, his charitable Musk Foundation donated $10 million to the Future of Humanity Institute to conduct research on the control of artificial intelligence.
- Together with his sons, he goes hiking in the forest, considering it necessary to teach them to be independent and not be afraid of difficulties.
- When asked about his favorite animal, he answered - the Beastbug from the planet Traal.
Take a look at the main episodes of the biography of Elon Musk:
Elon Musk was born on June 28, 1971 in Pretoria, South Africa.
“Elon has always been an introvert. Where most people will go to a great party, Elon will spend more time reading in the library. For him, they were entertainment. Once, at the age of 3-4 years, he asked a question: “Where does the whole world begin and end?". Questions like this let me know that he thinks in a special way, ” - in an interview, Elon's father Errol Musk shared his memories.
Elon's mother, Maye Musk, is a Canadian by nationality, a professional and a model whose face appeared on cereal packages. Special K and magazine cover time.
In 1979, Errol and Maye Musk's parents divorced. 9-year-old Elon and his younger brother Kimbal decided to stay with their father.
In 1983, at the age of 12, Elon sold his first written game to a computer magazine called Blastar for 500 dollars. That game Musk himself considered trivial.
The school years of the young researcher were not the best. Ashley Vance book "Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX and a quest for a fantastic future" tells the story of how Musk was hospitalized when a group of bullies at school pushed him down the stairs and beat him unconscious.
After graduation, Ilon, along with his mother Maye, sister Tosca and brother Kimbal, moved to. He spent the next 2 years studying at Queens University in Kingston, Ontario, Canada.
However, Ilon began to continue his studies at, where he received degrees in physics and economics.
While studying in Pennsylvania, Elon and his friend from the university, Adeo Ressi (Adeo Ressi) rented a 10-room house, which, at times, turned into a real nightclub. It was an early entrepreneurial experiment for both students.
After graduating from the university, Elon decided to continue his studies for a degree PhD(Ph.D.) at , but eventually gave up and decided to test his luck in the beginning Internet fever. Elon Musk will never remember studying at Stanford again.
Elon and his brother Kimbal (pictured below) took $28,000 from their father's budget to start the company. Zip2— a web startup that provided city travel guides to newspapers such as New York Times and Chicago Tribune .
According to Musk, while the company Zip2 got to his feet, he literally lived in the office and took a shower at the local branch of the youth volunteer organization YMCA . All these efforts will be generously rewarded at a time when the company Compaq will acquire Zip2 behind $ 341 000 000 .
Photo: Noah Berger | REUTERS Elon Musk's own budget after the deal will be $ 22 million, half of which in 1999 the young entrepreneur will spend on the foundation of another company in the field of online banking - x.com. A year later the project merge with a startup confinity, which by then had been founded by Peter Thiel. This association will create a new company, which will be called PayPal.
Elon Musk has been appointed CEO of the newly created company PayPal. But after some time, serious quarrels will arise within the project: Elon insisted on transferring the company's servers from a free operating system Unix on a product that the CTO disagreed with PayPal Max Levchin (pictured).
Photo: Getty | Drew Angerer In 2000, Musk took his first vacation in a long time. While Elon was, the board of directors PayPal decided to fire him and made Peter Thiel the new CEO.
"That's the problem with vacations", - Elon will joke later in one of his interviews.
However, Musk will remain one of the largest shareholders. paypal, which will bring him 165 million dollars of the $ 1.5 billion amount that in 2002 he will pay for PayPal company eBay.
Even before the sale PayPal sci-fi buff Musk had already hatched the idea of sending mice or plants to Mars. He even tried to acquire decommissioned Soviet missiles for this purpose. But the Russian seller wanted more than $8 million for the rocket, prompting Musk to consider building his own cheaper version.
In 2002, Elon Musk founded a company known as Space Exploration Technologies or simply SpaceX. Musk's goal will be to develop processes that will help make space travel more accessible.
Photo: Mario Anzuoni | Reuters The first devices SpaceX will become Falcon 1, named after the spaceship "Millennium Falcon" (Millenium Falcon) from the movie Star Wars..
..and the ship SpaceX Dragon, named after the song "Puff the Magic Dragon". With this name, Elon Musk wanted to answer all the skeptics who claimed that SpaceX will never be able to launch a spacecraft.
Long term goal SpaceX is the colonization of Mars. In an interview, Musk said that he would not withdraw shares SpaceX in an IPO (initial public offering) until the "colonial transporter to Mars" makes regular flights.
At the same time, quite a lot of tasks for Elon Musk remain on Earth. In 2004, he makes his first investment of $70 million in Tesla Motors is a manufacturing company that he co-founded with one of the world's most experienced executives, Martin Eberhard.
Elon Musk took an active role in working on the company's products, and also took over as chairman. He also helped develop the first electric car - Tesla roadster, the release of the first version of which began in 2006.
Photo: Scott Olson | Getty Images Since this was not enough, in 2006 Musk implemented the idea solar city- a manufacturing company whose products were supposed to help in the fight against . To develop the company, Elon Musk brought in his cousins Peter and Lyndon Raive.
Getting back to business tesla, things did not go quite the way Elon himself expected. Under the leadership of Eberhard Tesla burned more financial resources than it could bring in. In 2007, at the initiative of Musk, at one of the meetings of the board members, Eberhard was suspended from further work.
In 2008, with the advent of the global financial crisis, Musk had to invest $40 million in Tesla and borrow another $40 million to avoid bankruptcy of the company. In the same year, Musk becomes CEO tesla, which, of course, is not accidental.
That year the company SpaceX, Tesla and solar city finally ruined Musk. He describes 2008 as the worst year of his life because Tesla continued to lose money, and SpaceX had problems launching a rocket Falcon 1. By 2009, Elon survived only through personal loans.
Photo: Bobby Yip | REUTERS Around the same time, Elon Musk is going through a divorce from his first wife, Justine Musk, a Canadian writer who gave him 6 sons.
2008 brings Elon two good news: SpaceX receives a $1.5 billion contract with NASA for flights into space, but for business Tesla Finally, there are external investors.
By 2010, the situation is again seriously changing: in June of that year Tesla is valued at $226 million in IPO and becomes the first public since Ford in 1956. At this point, Elon sells $15 million worth of shares in the company to get his financial condition back on track.
Photo: Brendan McDermid | REUTERS Elon Musk's extraordinary career has become visible in other circles as well. Image of Tony Stark from "Iron Man" was partly based on Elon's real life. Moreover, in the second part of the film, Musk himself appears in the frame.
All this time personal life Ilona was filled with a series of various events. In 2008, he began dating actress Talulah Riley. In 2010 they will get married, and in 2012 they will divorce. By July 2013, they will get married again, but in December 2014, Elon Musk will file for divorce again, although he will take back the documents after that. Riley will file for divorce in March 2016.
Photo: Pascal Le Segretain | Getty Images Things with work in that period will go well. By the end of 2015 SpaceX will make 24 successful launches to the International Space Station, making many explorations in the process. Some time later Falcon 9 will make the first successful landing of a reusable orbital rocket on a water platform.
Ideas still do not stop visiting Elon Musk. Despite the movement towards the development of solar energy, electric vehicles and the colonization of Mars, Musk began to develop a new project called hyperloop- a transport system capable of moving passengers over considerable distances at a speed of more than 1000 km / h.
Elon Musk is convinced that in the near future humanity may face the threat of losing control over artificial intelligence, in connection with which, at the end of 2015, the entrepreneur presented another - Open AI , the purpose of which will be development monitoring.
Photo: jurvetson | Flickr In early 2016, Elon Musk's next incredible project became known - for the production of lithium-ion batteries, the area of \u200b\u200bwhich will be more than 300,000 square meters. The Gigafactory is expected to be able to produce more batteries than all similar factories around the world combined. The launch of the project is scheduled for 2020.
