Let's talk!

Elon Musk - Biography & Facts - Britannica

  • click to rate

    Video released by spacecraft maker Space, X commemorating its Dragon capsule, which on May 25, 2012, ended up being the first industrial spacecraft to dock with the International Space Station. Space, X (A Britannica Publishing Partner), (born June 28, 1971, Pretoria, South Africa), South African-born American business owner who cofounded the electronic-payment firm Pay, Pal and formed Space, X, maker of launch cars and spacecraft. He was also one of the very first substantial financiers in, as well as president of, the electrical car producer Tesla. Leading Concerns, Elon Musk was born upon June 28, 1971. Elon Musk cofounded the electronic payment firm Pay, Pal and established the spacecraft company Area, X.

    Elon Musk established Area, X, a business that makes rockets and spacecraft. He became the ceo and a significant funder of Tesla, which makes electric vehicles. Musk was born to a South African daddy and a Canadian mother. He displayed an early talent for computers and entrepreneurship. At age 12 he created a video game and offered it to a computer magazine. In 1988, after getting a Canadian passport, Musk left South Africa because he hesitated to support apartheid through compulsory military service and since he looked for the higher financial chances offered in the United States. Musk participated in Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, and in 1992 he transferred to the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, where he received bachelor's degrees in physics and economics in 1997.

    In 1995 he founded Zip2, a business that provided maps and service directories to online newspapers. In 1999 Zip2 was purchased Additional resources by the computer producer Compaq for $307 million, and Musk then founded an online monetary services business, X.com, which later became Pay, Buddy, which focused on transferring money online. The online auction e, Bay purchased Pay, Pal in 2002 for $1. 5 billion. Musk was long persuaded that for life to endure, humankind has to become a multiplanet types. Nevertheless, he was disappointed with the terrific cost of rocket launchers. In 2002 he established Space Exploration Technologies (Area, X) to make more affordable rockets.

    A 3rd rocket, the Falcon Heavy (initially released in 2018), was developed to bring 117,000 pounds (53,000 kg) to orbit, nearly two times as much as its biggest rival, the Boeing Company's Delta IV Heavy, for one-third the cost. Area, X has actually announced the successor to the Falcon 9 and the Falcon Get more info Heavy: the Super Heavy, Starship system. The Super Heavy very first stage would be capable of lifting 100,000 kg (220,000 pounds) to low Earth orbit. The payload would be the Starship, a spacecraft developed for offering fast transportation between cities in the world and developing bases on the Moon and Mars.

    Dragon can carry as numerous as seven astronauts, and it had a crewed flight carrying astronauts Doug Hurley and Robert Behnken to the ISS in 2020. Musk looked for to minimize the expense of spaceflight by developing a totally recyclable rocket that could raise off and go back to the pad it launched from. Beginning in 2012, Area, X's Insect rocket made several short flights to test such elon musk wife technology. In addition to being CEO of Space, X, Musk was likewise primary designer in building the Falcon rockets, Dragon, and Grasshopper. Get a Britannica Premium subscription and gain access to special material. Subscribe Now Musk had actually long been interested in the possibilities of electrical cars, and in 2004 he became one of the significant funders of Tesla Motors (later relabelled Tesla), an electric vehicle company established by entrepreneurs Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning.