Elon Musk — when the impossible becomes possible

Much has been said about Elon Musk. No wonder, because who would want to know the history of a man who is at the top of the list of the richest people in the world? But he wasn’t always at the top.

Elon Reeve Musk was born fifty-one years ago in Pretoria, South Africa. Although his family was not poor, the environment in which he grew up was not the most pleasant. He was harassed at school, and he even ended up in hospital because of it. After his parents divorced, he moved to his father — an engineer and, as he claims, he inherited his interest in technology. The housekeeper made sure that his passions did not destroy the house because, as he says himself, he made explosives and rockets. Nevertheless, he was already interested in computer science then. When, at the age of 10, he received his first computer, he began to learn programming and soon, two years later, he sold the Blastar computer game he had created. The earned money was later invested by $ 500 in stocks. At the age of 17, he moved to Canada to live with his mother’s family, who lived a life straight from Indiana Jones movies (grandfather was an archaeologist, he was looking for the legendary city of Kalahari and was the first to fly a single-engine plane from South Africa to Australia). There he also worked physically until he obtained a scholarship at the University of Pennsylvania. He then moved to the USA.

In the USA, he earned his BA in Economics and Physics. It was a time for him when he discovered how important the Internet would be for the future and learned how to save. He mentions that he had to live on less than a dollar a day. He put everything on the internet. He resigned from doctoral studies after two days. Soon after, he and his brother opened the Zip2 company — the company was responsible for keeping a virtual phone book and in the beginning the office served as a bedroom for both brothers. Elon worked on the technical side and his brother Kimbal on marketing. Contracts with large companies saw the company grow rapidly to sell Zip2 to Compaq in 1999. Elon then received $ 22 million from the sale and bought a McLaren F1, which he quickly smashed. The rest of this amount was invested in X.com. The company ran a website that supports electronic payments via e-mail. As before, the board was unhappy with Musk’s CEO and was dismissed, and the company changed its name to PayPal. In 2002, the sale of PayPal to eBay earned Elon a profit of $ 175 million.

And from then on, Elon Musk was able to retire and sip colorful drinks. However, he wanted to create a rocket and start colonizing Mars. So he opened the third SpaceX company. Since 2006, he has created three rockets, which, however, did not reach orbit. In 2008, another Falcon 1 reached orbit around the Earth. It was then that he signed a contract with NASA to carry out supply flights to the International Space Station.

It continues to strive to make the human species “multiplanetary” and to make space travel accessible to ordinary citizens.

Parallel to SpaceX, he was running another project. He also invested $ 6.5 million in Tesla Motors and thus became the majority shareholder. All this in order to launch the first series-produced electric car powered by a lithium-ion battery at the end of 2008, the project of which he was also working on. The sale was quite successful and it is clear that Musk foresaw the need for clean cars. In 2020, production at Tesla’s factories exceeded one million units per year.

The projects mentioned above elevated Elon Musk to the top and made him appear on the lists of the richest people in the world. However, these are not the only projects in which it participates.

The Boring Company — a company that builds tunnels under cities that would replace traffic in the future.

Solar City — a photovoltaic company.

Neuralink — deals with the neurotechnology side and brain-machine interfaces.

There are many rumors about who he is, and even more about him as a human being are mentioned in the paid settlements. But it is also worth mentioning his philanthropic activities. It supports scientific education, paediatrics and research on ecological energy.

Undoubtedly, Elon is a visionary and seasoned investor. So it’s not surprising that cryptocurrencies have become interesting to him. Not only does he invest in virtual money himself, but he also decided that it will be possible to pay for the purchase in Tesla stores via cryptocurrencies. And it is not only about buying gadgets, but also a flagship product, i.e. an electric car.

Often in social media, he talks about how he values ​​cryptocurrencies and his entries have an impact on their perception and even price. This is how he promoted Dogecoin and sometimes mentions on his profile that he is buying this cryptocurrency for his son for investment purposes.

Recently, it’s been loud about him again because of the purchase of Twitter. He paid $ 44 billion for it.

And although the matter is quite recent, he has already laid off a few managers. He also announces that he will restore the account of former President Donald Trump.

We can be sure that this is not the end of the realization of his vision.