-
Elon Musk's Birth
On June 28th, 1971 Elon Musk was born in Pretoria, South Africa to Errol and Maye Musk. -
Elon decides three major things he wanted to be apart of in his life
When Elon was entering Queen University in Canada in 1990 he decided that he didn't want to just be another person. He stated that on his first day of attending univeristy "I thought to myself, what were the areas that would most affect the future of humanity in my opinion: The internt, sustainable energy, and space exploration" (A conversation with Elon Musk). Eventually he would go on to achieve all three of these goals. -
Elon and his brother found Zip2
While attending school at the University of Pennsylvania, Elon Musk decided that he wanted to start a computer company that would essentially be the Yellow Pages of the internet. Eventually he sold this company to Compaq for $307 million dollars. -
Elon Musk Merges With Another Company and Forms PayPal
While he was pursuing his PhD in physics, he stated that "couldn't stand the idea of watching the internet happen" (A Conversation with Elon Musk). Thus, he decdied to create a company called X.com that adressed the problem of online monet payments. X.com would eventually merge with another company to form the paypal that we know today. Investments from paypal payed out big time for Elon; he earned over 2 billion dollars from investors and used that money to start his next venture. -
Elon Musk founds SpaceX
With huge investments coming into paypal, Elon musk decided to leave the company with his money and move on to something even greater. After a year of thinking about what he wanted to do, he decided to go through with starting a rocket company. -
Elon Musk Forms Tesla Motors
Elon decided that he would also start a new electric car company just in case SpaceX failed. He had a very simple gameplan that would drive the success of Tesla: "The goal of tesla has always been to have a three step process: version one was supposed to be a low volume high price model, version two was medium volume and medium price, and version three was high volume and low price” (Elon Musk Interesting interview at TED). The use of this model is apparent with the Model S and Roadster. -
Tesla Motors goes Public
Elon musk decided to make Tesla a public company and offered up its first IPO. Not only was the first IPO of a car company since the 1940s, Elon had earned over 260 million dollars in capital that he would use towards producing the model S. -
President Barrack Obama Tours the SpaceX Facility
After acquiring a substanial contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, President Barrack Obama decided to tour the SpaceX facility with Elon Musk (President Barrack Obama Tours The SpaceX Facility) Ever since they had met, Obama usually calls Elon to congratulate him on a successful Launch -
Tesla releases Its Patents For Public Use
Elon Musk decided that instead of hindering progress by other companies, he would release all of his patents so that the entire world could move along faster. He stated in a press release that patents nowadays "serve merely to stifle progress, entrench the positions of giant corporations and enrich those in the legal profession, rather than the actual inventors” (All Our Patent are Belong to You). Elon didn't simpley want to make money, he wanted to change the world.
