Elon Musk is the richest man in the world, a technological entrepreneur, and a potent business magnet. Do you know how did Elon Musk get rich?
He worked odd jobs when he was younger and is now the CEO of one of the largest corporations in the world.
This essay will examine how Elon Musk got rich and his approach to money management. To get to this point, Musk made several wise choices. He states, โI think it is possible for ordinary people to choose to be extraordinary.โ
How did Elon Musk Get Rich: 12 Top Ventures
1. Video Games and Musk
On June 28, 1971, Elon Musk was born rich in Pretoria, South Africa. Maye Musk, a model and dietician, born in Canada and reared in South Africa, is the boyโs mother. She was featured in several periodicals. His father, Errol Musk, is an electromechanical engineer in South Africa. As a member of the anti-apartheid Progressive Party, he won the election to the Pretoria City Council.
Video games have captured Muskโs attention since he was a little boy. With the aid of the VIC-20 user manual, he began learning programming and computing for video games at the age of 10. At 12, he released Blastar, his own video game, and sold it to PC World and Office Technology magazine. His initial earnings will be around $500 for this video game.
2. Zip2
After graduating from Pretoria Boys High School in South Africa, Musk intended to go to Canada to pursue further education. He briefly studied at the University of Pretoria in the meantime. He started at Kingston, Ontarioโs Queenโs University, in 1990. He moved to the University of Pennsylvania two years later and graduated with bachelorโs degrees in economics and physics.
He relocated to California in 1995 to pursue a PhD in materials science at Stanford University. Elon Musk withdrew from the program and developed the Global Link Information Network with his brother Kimbal. The company was renamed Zip2.
Zip2 was compared to an early version of Yelp and Google Maps by IT experts. Users and marketers might communicate in both directions using Zip2. Advertisers might receive messages from users and forward them to their fax machines. Similarly, advertisers might send consumers a fax, which users could read by visiting specified URLs.
The companyโs slogan is โWe Power the Press,โ In 1998, it teamed up with newspapers to provide local or comprehensive city guides. In February 1999, Zip2 was purchased by the American information technology company Compaq computer corp for $307 million in cash. Elon Musk, who is 27 years old, received $22 million for his 7% ownership. Musk worked tirelessly on Zip2โs software every day until he fell asleep, and his dedication greatly aided the companyโs development.
3. X.com and PayPal
In 1999, Musk co-founded an online financial service and e-payment company, X.com. It was one of the first federally insured digital banking services, with over 200,000 customers in its initial operation phase.
But unfortunately, he couldnโt last as CEO because the investorsโ choice was different.
PayPal began as a money-transfer service for the online bank Confinity before becoming a leader in electronic payments. He was appointed CEO in 2000 when X.com and Confinity merged. But a replacement was required because of his preferred technology and the businessโs financial situation.
With 11.72% of the stock, Elon Musk was the largest stakeholder and got $175.8 million when eBay bought PayPal for $1.5 billion in stock in 2002. He used the funds to invest in SpaceX, Tesla, and solar energy, and as a result, he surprised everyone by becoming a brilliant investor. Musk bought the X.com domain from PayPal in 2017.
4. SpaceX
Elon Musk frequently reinvests his profits from business ventures into his next one. And one such venture was SpaceX, a Space Exploration Technology that Musk founded with an investment of $100 million in May 2002. Musk later became the CEO and Chief Engineer of SpaceX. SpaceXโs main goal is to produce rockets at lower costs.
In 2006, the Falcon 1 rocketโs first three attempts to lift off toward Earth orbit failed. It had a major effect on the business, and as a result, practically everything failed. Musk, though, has no problem taking chances.
As part of their efforts to develop reusable rockets, SpaceX successfully landed Falcon 9โs first stage on an onshore platform in 2015.
SpaceX has made outstanding progress under Elon Muskโs direction. Its achievements include the first privately designed liquid-propellant rocket to orbit the Earth and the first private firm to launch, orbit successfully, and recover a spacecraft.
SpaceX is the first private company to deliver a spacecraft to the International Space Station, along with being the first to carry a person into orbit. SpaceX became the first commercial corporation to launch a crewed spacecraft and dock one with the ISS with Demo-2, its first crewed mission.
5. Starlink
With the establishment of the SpaceX satellite development facility in Redmond, Washington, in January 2015, Starlink became widely known. Elon Musk said there was still an unmet need for affordable internet capabilities worldwide at the opening.
The major commercial problem of creating user equipment designs that were sufficiently affordable was what the satellite division was concentrating on. Starlink offers affordable service in more urbanized areas and satellite internet connections to underdeveloped regions.
According to the corporation, its aspirations to colonize Mars would require a positive financial flow from selling satellite internet services. Last year, in 2021, Musk tweeted that โwith more satellite launches and software updates, customers will be able to move the Starlink device anywhere by the end of thee year.โ
SpaceX established contracts with Google Cloud Platform and Microsoft Azure for on-ground computing and networking services for Starlink in May 2021.
6. Tesla
In February 2004, Musk oversaw the Series A round of Tesla funding. He made a $6.5 million investment, becoming the companyโs largest shareholder, and was elected chairman of the board of Tesla. In 2008, after Eberhard was dismissed from the company due to the financial crisis, Elon Musk took over as CEO and product architect.
Musk had the longest tenure as CEO of any automaker worldwide. Electric car company Tesla has created history by becoming the first feasible and successful manufacturer of electric automobiles, thanks to the creative ideas of Elon Musk.
In 2008, Tesla produced the Roadster, the companyโs first electric sports automobile. Additionally, it released the Model X in 2015 after introducing the Model S sedan in 2012. The Model 3, a mass-market sedan, was introduced in 2017.
Musk tweeted that Tesla will produce 500,000 vehicles in 2019. In response to Muskโs post, the SEC filed a lawsuit and requested that the court hold him in contempt for allegedly breaking the conditions of a settlement agreement with such a tweet.
Elon Musk refuted the claim. A cooperative agreement between Musk and the SEC finally resolved this issue and clarified the specifics of the earlier accord. The Model 3 was the first to sell 1 million units globally, becoming the all-time best-selling plug-in electric vehicle in June 2021.
Many have lauded Elon Muskโs management style and attribute Teslaโs success to it. Tesla became the most valuable automaker in the summer of 2020 thanks to a sharp increase in the stock price.
It became the sixth firm in American history to surpass a $1 trillion market valuation. According to a poll on his Twitter account in November 2021, Musk sold a total of $16.4 billion projected as his 10% share in Tesla stock before the end of the year, which assisted with tax deductions.
Elon Musk revealed Optimus, a robot created by Tesla, in 2022. In a recent interview, Musk admitted that he first believed Tesla would fail. However, he persisted in beginning the business because he thought the risk was worthwhile.
7. Nueralink
Elon Musk joined the team that co-founded the brain-computer interface business Neuralink in 2016. The major topic of interest is neurotechnology. Such technology may improve memory or enable software communication between gadgets. The business wants to use high-bandwidth brain implants to establish a neurological connection between brains and computers.
The companyโs main objective is to make it easier for people with quadriplegia to use digital devices like computers and phones. Additional funding for the firm totals $205 million, coming from Google Ventures and other sources.
At the Primate Research Center of the University of California, Davis, Neuralink has conducted more animal testing on macaque monkeys. The company published a video in 2021 in which a macaque used a Neuralink implant to play the video game, Pong. Musk revealed plans for a Neuralink gadget in 2019 that may incorporate threads into the human brain.
8. Solar City and Tesla Energy
Elon Musk is renowned for his commitment to sustainable development and environmental problems. Lyndon and Peter Rive, Muskโs cousins, created SolarCity in 2006 with Muskโs initial idea and financial backing.
Elon Musk advocated for SolarCity to develop a state-of-the-art production plant in Buffalo, New York, in 2014. Up until the beginning of 2020, it was a joint venture with Panasonic.
Elon Musk does not create formal business strategies; instead, he favors an iterative design technique and a tolerance for failure to address engineering challenges.
In 2016, Tesla paid over $2 billion to purchase SolarCity, which it combined with its battery business to become Tesla Energy. Several accusations were made against Elon Musk after the purchase announcement and decreased his net worth, but in 2022, the court decided in Elon Muskโs favor, and the matter was resolved.
9. DeepMind
Concerned about how artificial intelligence may be used improperly in the future, Elon Musk is renowned for his caution. Maybe Elon Musk started to keep an eye on how that sector was changing, so he invested in DeepMind.
By fusing computer technology and biology to develop โartificial general intelligence,โ DeepMind, which Google purchased in 2014, claims to want to โsolve intelligence.โ Elon musk makes money through all the possible technologies and new business ventures.
10. Open AI
OpenAI is an artificial intelligence research organization founded by Musk in 2015 with the intent to build a safe and helpful AI.
The companyโs main objective is to democratize artificial superintelligence systems in the face of institutions like governments and businesses.
Musk has said that artificial intelligence is the greatest existential danger to humans. OpenAI has made tremendous strides in machine learning by creating neural networks like GPT-3 and DALL-E.
11. The Boring Company
Elon Musk never gives in to pressure; instead, he constantly finds the best solutions to put up with criticism and fix issues.
Musk founded The Boring Company and is a model. To manage traffic, enable quick point-to-point transit, and revolutionize cities, a tunnel construction firm was founded in 2017.
Musk and his crew built a test trench on the grounds of SpaceXโs offices to demonstrate and verify these conceptsโ viability. Early in 2021, a tunnel under the Las Vegas Convention Center was finished.
The business unveiled Godot, a Lovat conventional TBM, as its first machine. Line-storm, its second creation, was a modified traditional boring machine. The local authority has permitted the tunnel system to have additional extensions.
Its third machine, Prufrock, is designed to build massive infrastructure projects. Musk, meanwhile, has advocated for individualized mobility while criticizing public transportation. Rather than advertise the product, he invests in improving it.
12. Twitter
Musk has over 85 million followers and has been a frequent Twitter user since joining in 2009. Even as early as 2017, Musk indicated an interest in acquiring Twitter. The New York Times described Muskโs philosophy as โabsolute.โ
For $44 billion in 2022, Musk bought the social media site Twitter. The information that Musk had acquired a sizeable stake in Twitter came to light as a result of Muskโs tweets from March, in which he questioned Twitterโs commitment to free speech and suggested starting a competing social media platform, even though the remarks were made after he had purchased 7.5% of Twitterโs stock. This decreased his net worth and became a topic of discussion.
Top Twitter executives, including CEO Parag Agrawal, whom Musk replaced as CEO after the companyโs official acquisition on October 27, were sacked by Musk. It has been said that Musk treats his staff members directly through bulk emails in a โcarrot and stickโ manner, encouraging constructive feedback but also being prone to irrational threats, expletives, and firings.
Musk did not live an extravagant lifestyle. That might be another justification for increasing your savings. He is philanthropic and has donated to several causes that promote social development. Musk established a feedback loop to raise the bar for his businesses continuously. He establishes new trends and concentrates on offering value.
Elon Musk makes commitments and money with his experience and expertise in technology. Elon Muskโs net worth is $191.2 billion, and he is the worldโs richest person as of December 2022. He topped the list of tech billionaires, including Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg.
Suppose you want to learn more about Musk. In that case, you should read Ashlee Vanceโs book โElon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future,โ in which the author fully discusses Muskโs upbringing, his management style, and the ground-breaking ideas that have propelled the tech industry forward. Without a doubt, Musk is a role model for young people and the worldโs future generations.
Last Updated on by Sathi
