“I think it is possible for ordinary people to choose to be extraordinary”, quoted by this South-African born genius, billionaire, engineer, inventor and pretty much almost Iron-man, is an inspiration for countless of entrepreneurs today. The CEO of Tesla Motors, SpaceX and one of the founders of PayPal, he happens to be the world’s 83rd richest man with a net worth of around $20.9 Billion.
Early Life:
Elon Musk programmed his first videogame, called Blastar at twelve and sold it for $500 which made him a child paragon! At 17, during 1989, Musk went to attend Queen’s University in Canada, later shifting to Pennsylvania to pursue Economics and Physics from Stanford. Later on, after leaving Penn, he decided to get a Ph.D. in Energy Physics. Two days into the course he dropped out in order to focus on his start-up “Zip2”. He went on to achieve a multimillionaire status in his late 20s after selling Zip2 to Compaq Computers.
Initial stages of Entrepreneurship and struggles:
During his study days, added red peppers to his cost effective ramen noodles in order to prevent scurvy (Biology 101). To earn some quick cash, along with a friend, he rented a ten bedroom house where he threw MASSIVE house parties on weekends and earned through the entry fees.
In 1999, the creation of X.com came into the picture, which was an online financial service. This soon turned into PayPal which was bought over by eBay for $1.5 Billion!
SpaceX: 2002
Space Exploration Technologies Corporation, conveniently known as SpaceX, is a major space exploration program just like NASA but the difference being an aim to commercialize space travel (Imagine the Moon as a holiday destination!). Six years after being founded in 2002, SpaceX became well established and signed a contract with NASA for cargo transportation to the ISS (International space station). SpaceX made its breakthrough in 2010 when they sent a payload (Falcon 9) into the orbit and made it return safely. Currently, SpaceX is working towards rocket reusability, where a rocket can take multiple flights reducing cost and also will be a key to make human life multi-planetary.
Musk aims to colonize Mars and drop space travel cost to $100,000 from its current price of $100,000,000,000!
“I would like to die on Mars, just not on impact.” he said in a speech. Just recently SpaceX revealed the design of their very first space suit that appears exhilaratingly stylish.
Tesla Motors: 2003
Dedicated to the great inventor Nikola Tesla, the company aims at producing affordable, low-energy wastage electric cars. Tesla Motors came up with Roadster, a sports car capable of 60 mph acceleration in under 4 seconds! The Model S, which was their first electric sedan capable of covering 265 miles in between charges of its lithium ion battery, achieved the Car of the Year Award in 2013 by Motor Trend magazine. In April 2017 they outstripped General Motors and went on to dominate the market. The Model X even beat a Lamborghini Aventador in a quarter-mile drag race!
Hyperloop and Solar City:
Hyperloop is basically a mode of travel which works at ultra-fast speeds of about 1,200 km/h. Musk publicly introduced this concept in 2013. Hyperloop transportation would enrich train travel between cities by cutting down hours and days of travel. The mechanism involves low-pressure tubes in which compressed capsules travel on air-bearings.
Elon Musk’s SolarCity acquisition of August 2016 was quite a headline. Since then Musk owns almost half of their stocks. It was an advancement in Elon’s effort to provide sustainable energy to the world. Solyndra, a company that defaulted on a loan of $535 Million from the Department of Energy, has gotten its chance to repay by giving a 200,00 sqft facility to SolarCity on a lease. With an eye-watering price tag, Tesla’s Solar panel realizes the concept of homes powered entirely by solar panels.
All in all, along with being a genius businessman, Elon Musk is worth every penny he earns and the world needs more billionaires like him.