Video launched by spacecraft maker Space, X commemorating its Dragon capsule, which on May 25, 2012, became the 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 Area, X, maker of launch cars and spacecraft. He was also one of the Extra resources first significant investors in, in addition to primary executive officer of, the electric car manufacturer Tesla. Top Questions, Elon Musk was born on June 28, 1971. Elon Musk cofounded the electronic payment company Pay, Buddy and founded the spacecraft business Space, X.
Elon Musk founded Space, X, a company that makes rockets and spacecraft. He became the president and a significant funder of Tesla, which makes electric automobiles. Musk was born to a South African dad and a Canadian mom. He displayed an early talent for computers and entrepreneurship. At age 12 he created a computer game and sold it to a computer magazine. In 1988, after obtaining a Canadian passport, Musk left South Africa because he was reluctant to support apartheid through required military service and due to the fact that he looked for the greater financial opportunities offered in the United States. Musk participated in Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, and in 1992 he moved to the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, where he got bachelor's degrees in physics and economics in 1997.
In 1995 he founded Zip2, a company that supplied maps and service directories to online newspapers. In 1999 Zip2 was purchased by the computer manufacturer Compaq for $307 million, and Musk then founded an online monetary services company, X.com, which later on became Pay, Pal, which concentrated on moving money online. The online auction e, Bay purchased Pay, Pal in 2002 for $1. 5 billion. Musk was long convinced that for life to survive, humanity needs to become a multiplanet species. However, he was disappointed with the terrific expense of rocket launchers. In 2002 he founded Area Exploration Technologies (Area, X) to make more cost effective rockets.

A 3rd rocket, the Falcon Heavy (first launched in 2018), was created to carry 117,000 pounds (53,000 kg) to orbit, almost two times as much as its biggest rival, the Boeing Business's Delta IV Heavy, for one-third the expense. Space, X has revealed the follower Click here! to the Falcon 9 and the Falcon Heavy: the Super Heavy, Starship system. The Super Heavy first stage would can lifting 100,000 kg (220,000 pounds) to low Earth orbit. The payload would be the Starship, a spacecraft created for providing fast transportation between cities in the world and building bases on the Moon and Mars.
Dragon can bring as numerous as 7 astronauts, and it had a crewed flight carrying astronauts Doug Hurley and Robert Behnken to the ISS in 2020. elon musk twitter Musk looked for to lower the expense of spaceflight by establishing a completely recyclable rocket that might take off and go back to the pad it launched from. Beginning in 2012, Area, X's Insect rocket made numerous short flights to check such innovation. In addition to being CEO of Area, X, Musk was likewise chief designer in building the Falcon rockets, Dragon, and Grasshopper. Get a Britannica Premium membership and gain access to unique material. Subscribe Now Musk had long been interested in the possibilities of electric cars and trucks, and in 2004 he ended up being one of the major funders of Tesla Motors (later renamed Tesla), an electrical cars and truck business founded by entrepreneurs Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning.