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Birth
Elon Musk was born on June 28, 1971 in Pretoria South Africa. (Gregersen) -
Creates his own computer game
In 1983, Elon Musk created his own computer game at age 12. (Gregersen). Creating your own computer game is hard, and to be doing it at age 12 shows how intelligent Elon really was. -
Leaves South Africa to attend college
At age 17 in 1989, Elon Musk left South Africa to go to Queens College in Canada. (Ford) I think it is extremely powerful that Elon left his home at 17; all seniors at Libertyville are nervous to move across the country and Elon Musk at our age moved to another continent alone! -
Elon Musk goes to The University of Pennsilvania
Elon Musk transferred to the University of Pennsylvania to minor in Business and major in Physics. (Welch). I think that after four years of going to college in Canada, most people wouldn’t be ready to move to another country. However, Elon not only moved to another country, but he also went to another college to further his education which shows how hard his work ethic is. -
Elon Transfers to Stanford University
Elon Musk transferred to Stanford University to pursue a degree in high energy physics. (Elon). After not only going to 2 colleges, Elon continues his academic career by planning to study high energy physics, something very difficult which shows how smart he really is. -
Elon Musk drops out of Stanford University
Just two days after Elon Musk went to Stanford, he dropped out. (Ford) Elon drops out of Stanford to work full time on his new company showing that he is a savvy business man as much as an academic scholar. -
Elon startes his first company Zip2
Elon dropped out of Stanford University to start his own company, Zip2. Zip2 was a company that provided newspapers content through the internet. (Ford) By tackling an internet company, Elon shows the first glimpse of his long term visions and being able to look ahead instead of trying to fix what’s happening now. -
Compaq Computer buys Zip2
In 1999 Compaq Computer bought Zip2 from Elon Musk for 307 million dollars and 34 million dollars in the stock market! (Elon) I think that selling Zip2 shows that Elon had greater visions than a simple internet company and would need multiple start-ups like Zip2 to get him where he wanted to go. -
Elon Musk co-starts his second company, X.com
Immediately after Elon sold his first company he went right to work to make his second company X.com. X.com was an online payment service. (Vance) I believe that beginning to work on another company show s that Elon is who he portrays in the picture (see primary source cartoon) -
Ebay bought X.com from Elon Musk
EBay bought X.com from Elon Musk for 1.5 billion dollars in 2002. The company name had been changed to PayPal and Elon still had 11% of the stock. (Elon) Selling his second company which he could have sold for more only magnifies the fact that Elon is passionate about something greater than the internet and is taking all means necessary to get there. -
Elon Musk starts SpaceX
Again, immediately after Elon Musk sold PayPal, or X.com, he started Space Exploration Technologies Corporation, or SpaceX. Elon's main goals of SpaceX were to be the first private sector company to take a payload to the International Space Station; and to eventually go to Mars (Ford) Finally, we are able to see what Elon is truly passionate about because this is the first company we can really see how brave and risky Elon actually is because he almost fails, but puts all of his wealth into Spac -
Elon Musk starts Tesla
In 2003 Elon Musk co-started Tesla, an electric car company. (Ford) Starting Tesla also shows us how invested and how passionate he was about SpaceX and Tesla because like SpaceX, Tesla was only 3 days away from going out of business when Elon Put all of his money into Tesla and ended up succeeding. -
SpaceX granted permission to fly supplies up to International Space Station
Elon Musk's company was granted permission to fly supplies up to the international space station. (Interview by Stephen T. Colbert). Elon became the first privately funded company to fly supplies to the ISS showing that one again Elon's persistence and success comes from hard work. -
Tesla launches its first model
Tesla Motors launches its first car and raises 226 million dollars. (Elon Musk the Mind behind Tesla). Elon Musk not only paid off the loan he was given to start electric cars by the Obama Administration, but also paid off the debt AND gave a bonus payment of 20 million dollars. So consequently unlike most investments by the government end up; the government actually profited from investing in Elon. Which is why some say Elon is the best CEO of the modern era (Tapscott). -
Elon Musk founds the Musk Founsation
The Musk Foundation supports space exploration and the preservation of the human race through clean and reliable energy. (Elon) The Musk foundation is the best way to see how passionate Elon is about going to mars and becoming a clean energy planet because he funds projects that cost him money, but he also enjoys the projects because he is so passionate. -
Elon Musk releases the idea of the "Hyperloop"
Elon Musk releases his newest idea, the Hyperloop. The Hyperloop is a form of transportation similar to trains. However, the Hyperloop travels at speeds greater than 700mph. The Hyperloop also costs 6billion dollars, one tenth the cost of California's rail system currently being built. (Elon Musk the Mind behind Tesla,) As I was researching Elon Musk for this project I realized that he does not only want to use clean energy, but also he wants to make methods of transportation faster and cheap -
Elon makes all of his Tesla PAttents available to the public
Elon Musk makes every single he had patented available to the public to hopefully further electronic vehicles development. (Interview by Stephen T. Colbert) Elon Musk takes a major step by basically letting other people take the ideas that he had created to better electronic cars. It shows that Elon doesn’t care about money, but rather clean energy.