Video launched by spacecraft maker Space, X celebrating its Dragon capsule, which on May 25, 2012, became the very first commercial spacecraft to dock with the International Spaceport Station. Area, X (A Britannica Publishing Partner), (born June 28, 1971, Pretoria, South Africa), South African-born American entrepreneur who cofounded the electronic-payment firm Pay, Friend and formed Space, X, maker of launch automobiles and spacecraft. He was also one of the very first significant investors in, in addition to president of, the electric cars and truck maker Tesla. Top Questions, Elon Musk was born upon June 28, 1971. Elon Musk cofounded the electronic payment firm Pay, Buddy and established the spacecraft business Space, X.
Elon You can find out more Musk established Space, X, a business that makes rockets and spacecraft. He ended up being the ceo and a major funder of Tesla, which makes electrical vehicles. Musk was born to a South African daddy and a Canadian mom. He displayed an early skill for computer systems and entrepreneurship. At age 12 he developed a computer game and sold it to a computer system magazine. In 1988, after getting a Canadian passport, Musk left South Africa due to the fact that he hesitated to support apartheid through mandatory military service and because he looked for the higher economic opportunities offered in the United States. Musk went to Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, and in 1992 he moved to the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, where he received bachelor's degrees in physics and economics in 1997.
In 1995 he founded Zip2, a company that supplied maps and business directories to online papers. In 1999 Zip2 was purchased by the computer system maker Compaq for $307 million, and Musk then established an online financial services company, X.com, which later ended up being Pay, Friend, which specialized in moving money online. The online auction e, Bay purchased Pay, Buddy in 2002 for $1. 5 billion. Musk was long convinced that for life to survive, humanity needs to end up being a multiplanet species. Nevertheless, he was disappointed with the great cost of rocket launchers. In 2002 he established Space Exploration Technologies (Space, X) to make more inexpensive rockets.
A third rocket, the Falcon Heavy (initially introduced in 2018), was designed to carry 117,000 pounds (53,000 kg) to orbit, nearly twice as much as its biggest rival, the Boeing Company's Delta IV Heavy, for one-third the cost. Area, X has actually revealed the successor to the Falcon 9 and the Falcon Heavy: the Super Heavy, Starship system. The Super Heavy very first stage would can lifting 100,000 kg (220,000 pounds) to low Earth orbit. The payload would be the Starship, a spacecraft designed for providing fast transportation in between cities in the world and constructing Find out more bases on the Moon and Mars.
Dragon can carry as lots of as seven astronauts, and it had a crewed flight bring astronauts Doug Hurley and Robert Behnken to the ISS in 2020. Musk sought to reduce the cost of spaceflight by developing a completely reusable rocket that could take off and return to the pad it introduced from. Beginning in 2012, Space, X's Grasshopper rocket made a number of brief flights to test such innovation. In addition to being CEO of Area, X, Musk was likewise chief designer in developing the Look at more info Falcon rockets, Dragon, and Insect. Get a Britannica Premium subscription and gain access to exclusive content. Subscribe Now Musk had actually long been interested in the possibilities of electrical vehicles, and in 2004 he became one of the major funders of Tesla Motors (later renamed Tesla), an electric vehicle company founded by entrepreneurs Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning.