Video launched by spacecraft maker Space, X celebrating its Dragon capsule, which on May 25, 2012, became the very first industrial spacecraft to dock with the International Space Station. Area, X (A Britannica Publishing Partner), (born June 28, 1971, Pretoria, South Africa), South African-born American entrepreneur who cofounded the electronic-payment company Pay, Pal and formed Area, X, maker of launch vehicles and spacecraft. He was likewise one of the very first significant financiers in, as well as ceo of, the electric cars and truck producer Tesla. Leading Questions, Elon Musk was born on June 28, 1971. Elon Musk cofounded the electronic payment firm Pay, Friend and founded the spacecraft business Area, X.
Elon Musk founded Space, X, a business that makes rockets and spacecraft. He became the ceo and a significant funder of Tesla, which makes electrical automobiles. Musk was born to a South African dad and a Canadian mom. He displayed an early Go here skill for computer systems and entrepreneurship. At age 12 he produced a computer game and offered it to a computer system publication. In 1988, after acquiring a Canadian passport, Musk left South Africa due to the fact that he hesitated to support apartheid through compulsory military service and since he looked for the greater economic opportunities readily available in the United States. Musk attended 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 established Zip2, a company that supplied maps and company directory sites to online papers. In 1999 Zip2 was bought by the computer manufacturer Compaq for $307 million, and Musk then established an online monetary services company, X.com, which later on ended up being Pay, Friend, which focused on moving money online. The online auction e, Bay bought Pay, Pal in 2002 for $1. 5 billion. Musk was long persuaded that for life to survive, humanity needs to become a multiplanet species. However, he was disappointed with the great cost of rocket launchers. In 2002 he established Space Expedition Technologies (Space, X) to make more affordable rockets.
A 3rd rocket, the Falcon Heavy (initially introduced in 2018), was created to bring 117,000 pounds (53,000 kg) to orbit, almost twice as much as its biggest competitor, the Boeing Company's Delta IV Heavy, for one-third the expense. Area, X has announced the follower to the Falcon 9 and the Falcon Heavy: the Super Heavy, Starship system. The Super Heavy first phase would can raising 100,000 kg (220,000 pounds) to low Earth orbit. The payload would be the Starship, a spacecraft created for offering quick transport between cities on Earth and developing bases on the Moon and Mars.
Dragon can carry as many as 7 astronauts, and it had a crewed flight carrying astronauts Doug Hurley and Robert Behnken to Click here for more the ISS in 2020. Musk sought to decrease the expenditure of spaceflight by establishing a fully reusable rocket that could take off and return to the pad it launched from. Beginning in 2012, Space, X's Insect rocket made several brief flights to evaluate such innovation. In addition to being CEO of Space, X, Musk was also chief Discover more here designer in constructing the Falcon rockets, Dragon, and Insect. Get a Britannica Premium subscription and gain access to special material. 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 cars and truck company established by entrepreneurs Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning.